On the Head of a Pin
by The Wild Samlet
Summary: Nero finds himself thrust into a strange place and time, pursued by the evil entity that stranded him there. Even the Dante here is foreign, but Nero has no choice but to hope he can be trusted. DMC3/DMC4 Crossover. Eventual DantexNero.
1. Descent

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

_Warnings_: This story contains violence, potential gore, and future manry gayness. You have been warned. Please leave if this offends your delicate sensibilities and refrain from making them known, because I can assure you, I have better things to care about.

_Full Synopsis_: Beneath Fortuna Castle lies Agnus' lab, full of dangerous secrets and buried treasures. When the Knights of the broken Order accidentally release something best left to die in the darkness, Nero is rocketed backward in time to a place he doesn't recognize, to meet a Dante he doesn't know. Eventually DantexNero slash.

Story beta read by my good friend, Cerulean Twin, who also writes marvelous fanfiction!

* * *

**Mission 01: Descent**

* * *

Boredom.

It was a feeling Nero had grown all too intimate with lately. It crawled dully up his spine and into his brain, making him yawn and fidget and sigh. There was nothing to do; nothing of interest, anyway. Nothing since the Savior had been put down and Fortuna had been made safe once again. At first there had been demons to round up and civilians to rescue, but now…there wasn't even a chance encounter with a Scarecrow, wiggling in morbid glee and scythes grinning at the ready, to look forward to.

This was a good thing; Nero did his best to remind himself of this whenever the boredom tried to overtake him. The people of Fortuna were good and honest, and they deserved a safe place free of the dangers meant only for a demon hunter. At first the betrayal of the Order had been a deep wound to the people of the city; they had trusted and believed in the Sword, but slowly those knights innocent of devilish transgressions had been given an unspoken forgiveness.

The Order was castrated and would never rise to power again, but its Knights kept peace in the beautiful city, and were among the foremost to organize reparations of the damage Sanctus and his pawns had caused. Chunks of the crumbling Savior were one of the higher priorities in this endeavor, as they littered the city streets far and wide. Homes and other buildings had been damaged, destroyed, and at worst crushed with their occupants still inside and all of this needed to be cleaned and rebuilt. The remnants of the Order made good on their debts, and Nero was among them at first.

But, toiling away with the workforce clearing rubble and starting the framework of new houses was not something Nero was taking to with much relish. He couldn't use his Devil Bringer to quicken the work because most people who saw it feared it, and would by proxy come to fear him in all likelihood. He'd seen the looks on their faces, and heard their whispering. It was something he wanted to avoid.

He missed Dante, though he would _never_ admit it within earshot of the older man. Their introduction may have been rocky, but there was no denying that Dante understood him. Nero couldn't help but think that Dante knew him better than he had known himself for a little while. How else had he known that beating some sense into Nero was the best way to calm him down? Nero sighed. He thought of Yamato, resting dormant inside his right arm, and missed the man in red all the more.

And then, there was Kyrie. Her beauty and tender kindness never faded, but…it was different now. Before when there had always been demons to fight, he could find her and feel satisfied in protecting her from any danger. But, now there was nothing to protect her from, and he felt a little lost when he was with her. He'd seen in her eyes that she knew it, and that his feelings hurt her, but he didn't know what to do. Settling down with Kyrie had been his dream when he had nothing to do but fight and protect, but at last they finally _could_ settle and he balked at the idea. If he was bored now, mere weeks after the last encounter with a Scarecrow in the streets, how would he feel in months? Years? He thought it might drive him crazy.

The Order had taken much from the city of Fortuna, but it had given Nero a purpose, however violent. Without it, what good was he if he couldn't find happiness in settling down? Sure, rubble still needed clearing and buildings still needed repairing but he felt too alienated to try to help any more.

He could see Kyrie from his perch, sitting with his legs dangling over the edge of the rooftop. The sun was setting over the city and its light made the color of her hair blaze. She was with _him _again. Nero scowled, clenching and un-clenching his fists as he watched the couple from far away. They couldn't see him from where they were, but he could see them perfectly well. He assumed off-hand that it was a benefit of his so-called demonic heritage.

Whatever. It wasn't as though that mattered now. His blue eyes fell to gaze on his Devil Bringer. He was angry about Kyrie spending so much time with _him. _Nero would have been less angry if he understood why he felt the way he did. He wasn't jealous, or enraged that she would step out on him. Nero simply…didn't care. It was almost a relief that she was finding someone else to settle down into a boring life with. No, it wasn't Kyrie who made him angry, or being jealous. Feelings were stupid, the young Knight thought, especially when you didn't understand them.

He clenched the fingers of his glowing right hand into a fist, glaring at the clawed appendage as though it knew the answers to all of his questions and was refusing to divulge them. It simply glimmered silently at him, and he sort of thought it might be gloating.

His gaze returned to the couple far below. It wasn't even like the guy was a bad person, or even a bad match for Kyrie. Nero sort of liked him, which also made him angry. The guy was a Knight, and like most of them still wore his white uniform. He was a little older than Kyrie, but she was older than Nero, so it didn't rankle as much as he would have thought. The guy was…nice, and _who the hell thinks the guy that's stealing your girlfriend is nice?_ Nero didn't know but it made him feel like an idiot. Maybe some sort of silent agreement was supposed to have gone down with him and Kyrie about her dating other men, and Nero just hadn't noticed?

He wondered if he had noticed, or if there had even been a discussion, would he care then?

Nero sighed in frustration, turning his gaze elsewhere. Someone was on their way out to his spot on the edge of the roof. Another Knight, he guessed, and turned around to glare up at Cassius, who stopped walking a few steps away from Nero, looking a little pale.

Ah, right, Cassius was the one who hated heights. Nero had to resist a snort of derision. A fine thing the leftovers of the Order were. Lovesick pricks, cowards, and misfits. It was a generalization to be sure, but it seemed to sum up the majority of what remained of the Holy Knights, Nero included.

"What?" he demanded, glaring at the dark-haired Knight.

"Regulus needs you," Cassius muttered, well-away from the edge of the roof, "I'm supposed to find Leone as well."

Nero pointed wordlessly over the edge of the roof toward the couple that had been dominating his thoughts, and smirked slightly. It forced Cassius closer to edge of the roof to look down and spot the other Knight he was seeking. It was a small mean thing, but Nero couldn't help teasing the other Knight, who was a year or two his junior. He didn't dislike Cassius, if it came down to it. The man was good in a fight if his feet were planted on solid ground, and he never did or said anything to personally piss Nero off, but he just lacked personality in Nero's opinion, so fucking with him was…fun.

"Ah," Cassius said, making an involuntary sound in the back of his throat and swiftly retreated from the edge once he had spotted the other target of his search, "Well then…Regulus. He wants to see you in the meeting hall at New Headquarters."

"Why?" Nero asked, interested piqued, though he would never admit it. He and authority had never seen eye-to-eye, and now Regulus was authority, being the highest Knight in rank to survive after the destruction of the Savior.

"He didn't tell me why. Only said it was important," Cassius answered coolly.

Nero swung his legs around from the edge and stood up, "Alright, it's cool. I guess I'll go see him now, if I gotta."

He parted ways with Cassius after they had both descended the stairs from the roof, and made his way back to the Headquarters of the Order. His imagination was running wild now, and he didn't bother to stop it. This might mean that something interesting was finally going to happen, if Regulus was calling up Knights for a meeting. Nero hoped it meant a mission—one preferably with killing involved.

Nero tried to think what would possibly need doing now, and he could only think of Agnus' lab. They had already swept through the outskirt areas of the city, the Mitis Forest, Lamina Peak, and the rest, the only thing that hadn't been fully investigated was the lab in Fortuna Castle.

The outer areas of the city posed a more hopeful interest to him now. The places where the Hell Gates had stood before their destruction at Dante's hands were still there, as was Agnus' lab. The lab had not been the priority when half the city was suffocating beneath a disintegrating Savior, and demons were running amok, but now...

Had the time to plunder the depths of Agnus' mad research facility finally come? Nero's eagerness was tempered with caution, if that were the case. There would surely be some action down there, but his past experience made him wary also. No one knew what horrible things might be found down there.

But he hoped that was the reason behind this sudden summons, regardless of the danger.

As he entered the meeting hall, he saw two other Knights were already there waiting with their impromptu commander; the dark twins, Daniele and Davide. Regulus waved for Nero to hurry up and then said, "Once Cassius returns with Leone we can begin this."

Nero did not like Regulus. Regulus did not like Nero. But Regulus was practical and seasoned, and he knew that not liking someone was no reason to not make use of their talents. For that reason Nero respected the senior Knight, but he did not like him. The man was sour and humorless, and less forgiving than Credo had been, in all things. Nero doubted if anyone truly enjoyed his company, probably not even his wife if he had one.

Cassius returned with Leone in tow after a brief wait, and they strode up to meet the rest of the gathered Knights. At the sight of Leone, blonde and green-eyed and handsome, Nero thought of Kyrie and scowled at the other man. Leone gave him a slightly startled look and edged around him carefully. Nero was willing to bet that Kyrie had led the older Knight to believe she and he had had a clear break up.

Leone was a little too honorable to willfully take another man's girl, Nero thought. But it still made him a little sour that he hadn't been let in on any of this decision-making on Kyrie's side.

"Now that we are all _here_," Regulus said pointedly, and glared around at each of them until they all took their seats, "Some of you may have noticed others who were not invited to this meeting. There's a reason, I assure you. The six of us will be venturing out to Fortuna Castle tomorrow, in order to investigate the remains of the lab that Agnus had there."

Nero resisted the urge to jump up and shout 'Called it!' and instead settled for a discreet fist pump.

Regulus noticed and glared at him for a moment before continuing, "The five of you are the only ones that I have cleared to know about this mission and whatever we may discover down there. Nothing may leave this room about it. Do you all understand me?"

No one said anything, so Regulus seemed to take that as assent, "Good. We will all meet here again tomorrow at 0600. Be ready for combat."

Nero wasn't entirely sure the situation required the gravity that Regulus' tone gave it, but he kept his mouth shut and simply rolled his eyes. He doubted he was here for any reason other than the fact that he had been to the lab before, and none of these other men had. They needed his memory of the layout, in all likelihood.

Well, he was happy to oblige if it meant finally seeing some action. Or, if not action he hoped it would at least break the monotony.

* * *

And so, there they were the following morning, picking through the untouched laboratory. If it weren't for the dust beginning to collect over the surfaces below, one might have thought that Agnus had never left. Nothing had been disturbed since the researcher's death until today.

Not much could be said for the quality of Agnus' character, but the man kept impeccable records. Nero was grateful for that much at least, even if he had despised the mad scientist when the man had been alive. Having an organized space in which to keep record of his debaucheries made going through them much simpler for Nero and the other men who joined him in the nether levels of the Order's headquarters.

The excursion had already proven to be interesting so far. The group had been forced to fend off several Cutlasses that tried to bar their path into the laboratory, because of which Leone was now nursing the slashed elbow of his sword-arm, and his bruised pride. It could have been worse had one of the twins—Nero wasn't sure if it had been Daniele or Davide, he could hardly ever tell them apart—not yanked Leone backwards out of the way of further damage.

Nero wished they could have left Leone behind; his swordsmanship was stiff ever since he had shattered his collarbone and sword arm on duty last year. But, Nero wasn't in charge of this little expedition underground. _That_ responsibility still belonged to Regulus, and he didn't let Nero forget it. Nor did he let the young man forget that the only reason he had been brought along was because he was familiar with the area. It wasn't as though they might need Nero's fighting skills, the youth mused sarcastically. Where there were a few Cutlasses, there could always be more.

He looked up when a sudden cry erupted from one of the twins. All eyes in the room flew to the man as he stared at the contents of the manila folder clutched in his gloved fingers, shock plain on his face.

"What is it?" Regulus demanded, looking slightly displeased that a man under his command would show such blatant shock. Nero was willing to bet the sour man saw it as weakness.

Wordlessly, Davide held the folder out to their commander. It was Davide, Nero was reasonably sure. He didn't think Daniele would have vocalized his surprise so loudly. Regulus took the file from the other knight's trembling hand and looked down at its content, brows furrowing as his eyes took in whatever lay within.

"Well?" Nero asked impatiently after several minutes of silence had passed, "What is it?"

To his surprise, Regulus actually deigned to give him a reply, gruffly answering, "Agnus had been using…live test subjects for his research into the demonic powers. Humans, people from our city, kidnapped from their homes and families."

The idea did not shock Nero quite as much as it seemed to the other Knights around him, but he wondered if they had ever met the man when he was in the throes of a blind tirade. Or if they had ever been close enough to see that cruel gleam in his eyes. The look on his face when he had first seen Nero's Devil Bringer had told the youth all he had needed to know about Agnus.

All the same, it didn't make his actions any less despicable. Taking willing test subjects from among the Order was revolting enough, but kidnapping innocent people from the city…

Nero wished he could have killed Agnus himself.

"Did any of them survive?" Leone asked, coming up behind Regulus and peering over his shoulder at the file.

"Maybe," Regulus said, turning over a page, "He has some marked as deceased and others aren't, but—"

"Well we have to find them!" Cassius surprised everyone by interrupting, his voice ringing in the room, grey eyes slightly wild. Once all of their stunned expressions were focused on him, the youngest Knight wilted, and muttered in his more usual tone, "They could still be down here…"

"I doubt any person has survived this long without food or water," Regulus said to them, lips tight. He was angrier than Nero had ever seen him before, though the man hid it well. The rage wasn't directed at any of the other Knights in the room, but it was all the more fierce because it couldn't be directed at its object—Agnus was dead. Nero could sympathize with the older Knight.

"It's still our duty to look," Daniele pointed out quietly from his twin's shadow, "Regardless. If we're investigating the entire facility…"

"We may as well look for these test subjects first," Nero piped up, feeling like his opinion wasn't really wanted, but he couldn't stop himself. If there were people like him…like Dante or people who had demon blood in them, Nero wasn't so sure that they wouldn't still be alive, however barely.

Regulus glared around at each of them in turn, but he didn't seem entirely opposed to the idea. After a moment, he shrugged a shoulder and put the file down onto the desk they had all clustered around, "Take a look at these, then. We'll want to know what we're dealing with before we try to find these people."

There were photos. Nero picked one up before he read any of the other papers. What he saw made his gut clench, and he put the photo back down into the folder. He _thought_ it had been a child before…whatever had happened to it. Nero made an involuntary face, not wanting to think about it too hard.

"It looks like it's in a lower basement," Leone pointed out to one of the room numbers.

_Where all decent dungeons are_, Nero mused. But he kept it to himself, doubting whether any of the others would find it humorous. It wasn't surprising to him that there were even deeper layers to this nightmare house. His exploration of it hadn't exactly been cursory, but it hadn't been extensive during his first travel through the castle. There were still depths to Agnus' labs that Nero hadn't plundered.

Nero wondered if there would be more demons down there to fight. He couldn't help but hope so, despite himself. Demons would mean it would be eventful, if nothing else. If there were demons down there, at least the human test subjects would have died quickly instead of starving to death.

It was an empty justification but no one needed to know Nero's thoughts but himself.

He thought he had an idea where these prison cells would be, too. Nero had quite a vivid memory of the chamber in which Yamato had found him, and the notes in this file folder sounded as though it were near there. The background in some of the photos was also similar in architecture, but Nero wasn't an expert on that front.

Turning around, he started to head in that direction, but was halted after only a few steps by Regulus' voice as the man demanded, "Where do you think you're going, Nero?"

Nero suppressed a long-suffering sigh, and replied flatly, "To find the 'test subjects'." He finger quoted the words 'test subjects'. "Isn't that what's we're all about doing all of a sudden?"

"Not by yourself," Regulus said.

"Well nothing's gonna get done if I wait around for you guys to get done lolly-gagging," Nero retorted, standing with arms akimbo. _Damn,_ he thought, _I sound like Dante._

Regulus gave him a look, but the white-haired teen was not phased. He'd faced-down against Sanctus; this old guy right here was no match for that one. Nero smirked at him, and added, "What are you gonna do, _stop _me?"

"We _are_ ready to go," Leone cut in, ever the peace maker, "Nero, lead the way."

Nero rolled his eyes and turned back around, continuing his original trajectory. Before long they passed the shattered glass chamber that had once housed the broken Yamato, and Nero unconsciously clenched his right fist slightly. There was still debris from his fight with Agnus scattered around the floor here, and shards of glass crunched under the soles of Knights' boots as they passed through.

They descended.

It was dark. The rest of the castle had been dark, as had been the rest of the lab without electric power, but it wasn't a true blackness. The farther they went, the fainter the light from the door became, until it was just a pinprick and they had to stop to light the torches they had carried with them.

The beams of light reflected off of the walls on either side of them, and off of the low ceiling. They were descending down a shaft-like tunnel, it looked like, gradually sloping downwards in a curving spiral.

Had Nero been in more amiable company he would have expected a quip about using his arm to light their path, but no one said a word about it. He was willing to bet Dante would have pointed it out just listen to Nero grumble.

There were rats down here too. A few scurried underfoot as they went, and Nero heard one of the men behind him—probably Cassius judging by the pitch—gasp as one of the tiny bodies crunched under a boot with a final dying squeak.

Farther in, there was a smell. At first it was subtle, and Nero doubted anyone without his sensitive nose had picked it up. But the strength of it grew, and made the young devil hunter's stomach turn slightly. It was a smell of carrion, fetid and putrefying, and of waste. Nero didn't count himself an expert on the odors of shit or piss, but the tang of excrement was hard to miss down here in the closed space.

To their credit, none of the Knights following behind him complained about the smell either, though Nero was sure their noses were wrinkling just as much as his was doing. He tried not to think about the smell, though it did likely mean that they were closing in on their destination, which was sort of a relief.

But, they hadn't run into anything that wanted to kill them yet, which was a disappointing sign in Nero's opinion. It was looking like the trip down here was going to be depressing, boring, and putrid. Joy.

Soon enough the passage opened out into a true dungeon, cells rose up in the opposite wall and continued along the hall, some of ancient barred steel, others modern additions of newer plexiglass. The entire dungeon was dark and water dripped from cracks in the ceiling. Not too long ago, the place was probably a pristine prison, combination of modern and medieval, but Agnus probably kept a tight ship when he had still been alive.

They passed one such plexiglass cell door smeared black with what was undoubtedly dried blood, so caked on that the contents of the cell were obscured. Nero didn't want to know what was in there, but it reeked of decaying flesh.

The torch beams reflected off of the glass, and Nero looked away before he could get a better look. His right boot splashed into a dark puddle as he strode on, and he hoped it was water.

"Spread out," Regulus' voice cut into the dank space suddenly, making Nero jump, "Clustering like this isn't going to help anyone."

With silent agreement, the others Knights fanned out across the dungeons. Nero kept onward, deeper into its rank bowels, taking the opportunity to finally get out of the group and back comfortably on his own. His path took him around a corner and down a short set of stairs, and he nearly ran into the thick steel door cloaked in darkness abruptly half a foot from the bottom step.

"The hell…?" he muttered, examining the door. It was solid steel, he was betting several feet thick. It was the type of door that belonged over a bank vault, not in some dungeon with dead test subjects.

There were several symbols inscribed over what might have been a nameplate, but they were unfamiliar to Nero. He reached up and slid the metal panel that sat at eye level aside, revealing a strip of window through which he could look to inside. It seemed sort of pointless however. Without the lights there wouldn't be anything but darkness to see, and he was the only Knight who hadn't brought a torch.

Nero hated the idea of asking one of the other Knights for help. He doubted anyone would let him do his own thing if Regulus heard him asking for a torch. Cassius was probably his best bet.

Turning around, Nero crept back up the short stairwell and went to look for Cassius. At first glance the dungeons were small, but the darkness had cloaked all of the turns and passageways leading off to different areas, so it took him a good few minutes to find the younger Knight. He nearly collided with him in fact as they were both turning the same corner at the same time, but Nero had the reflex to sidestep just in time.

"Hey, I need your torch," he said once Cassius had gotten a good look at him to see who he was.

"My torch comes with me attached to it," the brunette replied.

Nero shrugged, "Cool with me. Just don't get in my way."

It was hard to tell, but Cassius might have rolled his eyes.

Together, the two teens picked their way back through the cell block and down to Nero's hard-to-spot passageway. When they got to the door, the metal cast the beam of his light back at them and the corner brightened slightly.

"Bleeding hell," he breathed, taking in the massive door, "What in the world is this?"

_Interesting,_ Nero thought smugly, but he said aloud, "Do you recognize those symbols?"

He pointed to the inscription and Cassius focused the beam on it, squinting at them, then raising an eyebrow, "I don't know. They _look_ Enochian, but nobody uses that language for anything but rubbish occult spells….right?"

Nero shrugged in answer. Cassius looked back at the symbols, his expression slightly uneasy, "I mean…Agnus was no fool. Why would these be here?"

Without Nero having to ask, Cassius shone the beam of light from his torch into the little window, and both young men peered inside. The light's narrow path didn't illuminate much, but it was enough.

"Someone's in there," Cassius said finally after the light had glanced off of a hand.

"Or pieces of someone," Nero argued, "Or something _pretending_ to be pieces of someone so we'll open the big magical door and let it out."

"They could be dying," the younger Knight pointed out.

"They could be _hostile_," the white-haired devil hunter disputed, but he was grinning. And if it was hostile? He'd beaten bigger things he was sure—some in this very castle. It would be fun, he'd get a workout. At the very worst they'd collapse the tunnel and have to climb back out.

How bad could it be?

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

Dante will make his appearance in the next chapter! Please sit tight until then; I am a firm believer in build up. XD Please stay tuned, and review if you liked it or have any constructive criticism!


	2. The Man in Blue

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

Story beta read by my good friend, Cerulean Twin, who also writes marvelous fanfiction!

* * *

**Mission 02: The Man in Blue**

* * *

"I've got it," Nero assured Cassius, and without even pausing, he gripped the wheel-lock on the door with his Devil Bringer and used it to unwind the hatch. When the tumblers clicked, he knew he'd done it right, and both Knights had to step back as the door swung open.

At once, the air changed. It wasn't the smell exactly, though the scent _did_ shift. It was the atmosphere around them that changed. A breeze filtered out from the open chamber, fresh and smelling of snow even though the cavern was clearly completely closed.

And then there was the song. At first, Nero heard it as the faintest ringing in his ears, but it grew into a whisper, and then into a hum, and he felt it in his chest. The song had no words, but that didn't matter. It had a spirit in it, a presence, and it was dizzying.

Cassius grabbed his forearm suddenly, going to one knee, and Nero could make a guess that the younger Knight was hearing it too. It was the type of thing that could drive someone mad, but Nero wasn't just any someone. He pushed the song to the back of his mind and stepped forward into the dark cell.

As soon as his boot crossed the threshold he was hit by the aura. It was decayed and faint, but at one point Nero could tell it had been powerful. Nero looked up at what awaited him, and had a sudden overwhelming feeling of unwelcome. He shouldn't be here.

It was person-shaped, which made looking at it worse, crucified in shackles against the wall. Nero could deal with giant fiery princes of Hell, or stabbing ruggedly handsome assholes in red longcoats through the chest, but this was different. A weaker man would have retched, or been left on his knees at the door like Cassius was.

There was a blindfold over its eyes, though judging by the dried blood caked on its cheeks he didn't think there were any eyes still there. The lips were sewn closed. Its hair was wild, silver blonde, streaming long passed shoulders bruised with wires and tubes and—what the _fuck_?—spikes of white-hot metal embedded in the flesh. How it was so scalding was a mystery to Nero but he didn't think he wanted to know.

Its right arm was literally embedded with the manacles, and its left was skeletal, as though acid had dissolved all but the bone. The person-shaped-thing was bandaged in some places, but it seemed to Nero like a wasted, half-assed effort. Dry blood caked the bandages in so many places, and dripped fresh in others. Its legs were horrific, forced to support its body by the cruel chains attached through the very skin and sinew. Blood coated its ankles, and its inner thighs, and Nero did not want to spend time thinking why.

Nero might have thought it was human had it not been for the wings. One was nailed to the wall behind it; red with its own blood, the other was as skeletal as its arm. It wasn't breathing, and if it hadn't been for the aura around the room, and the song, Nero would have assumed the person-shaped-demon was dead. But it trembled every now and then, and the song in the back of the devil hunter's mind was a constantly reminding distraction.

Nero didn't know what it was; what sort of demon would be so useful to Agnus while so cruelly confined. There was a spike embedded in its temple, he saw as he continued to step closer to it. A chain dangled from that spike too, and wound upward to where the other shackles originated.

That was the chain Nero destroyed with the Red Queen first, rage taking over where good sense should have prevailed. The chain shattered under the force of the blade, but Nero felt a violently painful shock jolt up his arms from the hilt of the sword as it happened. The chains were electrified with some sort of current that hadn't gone out with the electrical outage.

Nero stumbled backwards, panting slightly, his head aching as thought he'd just be struck by a bolt of lightning. Now the pieces of metal that had kept inexplicably white-hot made sense. They were perpetuating the current running through its body.

In front of him, the captive's head lolled, free of the chain that had kept it suspended, and the song in Nero's ears suddenly stopped, leaving him in stark silence. Behind him, he heard Cassius make a weak sound in his throat, and then heard the rustling of his uniform as he got to his feet.

Nero looked up again at the winged demon crucified to the wall as Cassius came up beside him. It was stirring slightly now, Nero could only guess because it no longer had that electrical charge running through its brain. Under the stitches sewing its mouth shut, its bloody lips contorted and strained, but could not break the thread.

"Got a knife?" Nero asked Cassius doubtfully.

"No," Cassius replied, looking annoyed, "But Davide has shears in his holster."

"Why the hell—" Nero started to ask, but broke off mid-sentence and shook his head, "Never mind. Go see if you can find him, I guess I'll try to find a power source down here. The chains holding this thing up are electrified."

"I'd guessed," Cassius replied, pointing to Nero's hair, which the hunter only then realized was standing on end. He hastily brushed it flat, feeling the static crackle under his fingers as he did so. "I don't know if this is a good idea," Cassius added, "I mean…"

"We can handle ourselves," Nero argued with him, "And you can't think leaving it like this is the right thing to do, regardless of if it's good or evil."

The younger Knight pressed his lips together in a thin line and nodded, "Yes, fine. I'll got try to find Davide…please don't do anything stupid without me."

As he strode off out of the cell, Nero turned back to the prisoner and grinned. Don't do anything stupid? Cassius must have forgotten who he was talking to. Like hell Nero was just going to stand here and wait.

He looked around the darkness, holding his glowing right arm up in an attempt to shed some more light. Damned Cassius had taken the torch with him. Nero could see alright in the dark without it now that he was in the cell, though. The room was small enough that it didn't gobble up the shimmer from his Devil Bringer and return it with pitch blackness.

What he was looking for was on the ceiling, as far as he could identify what _it_ was. The ceiling was covered in thick wires so that it looked like some sort of black spider's nest, all of them running to and from the captive. Nestled among the wires and cords was a pulsing orb. It didn't glow exactly; otherwise Nero would have seen it in the darkness, but just below its dark surface it seemed to glitter maliciously.

Without pause, he extended his Devil Bringer and Snatched the pulsating object out of the cradle of wires. Electricity crackled for a brief moment before dying, and the object hummed in Nero's palm. He pocketed it for later inspection.

The winged prisoner made a noise then, and Nero looked up at it quickly. It was moving more lucidly, clearly as a result of him yanking out whatever it was that he had yanked. A sound came out of the back of its throat like dried paper as it moved its head from side to side, as though it didn't understand why it couldn't see.

"Can you…uh, hear me?" Nero asked tentatively, palm resting cautiously on Blue Rose.

He got no answer, but something about the way it was moving in its shackles alarmed him suddenly, and he took a step back out of reflex. The muscles in its whole arm were straining, he could see even under the tatters of its remaining clothing, and suddenly the restraints snapped like brittle twine.

It lurched forward, and broke the chains holding its skeletal appendage before wrenching its legs free. Nero winced as a ring of anchoring iron ripped out of its Achilles heel. The needle-like shards of conducting metal made pinging noises as they cooled in the dank air, but the demon paid them no mind. Its single good wing was free now, and it flared open, wingtip meeting the ceiling easily. The skeletal wing extended upward as well, but fell short of its crimson twin.

The being stepped forward and lifted a sharp bone finger to its lips, ripping the thread away.

And then it screamed.

The sound was pure agony and rage and desperation and _pain_. It echoed off the walls and filled the dungeons and Nero crashed to his knees at the sound of it, gripping his ears and feeling like his eardrums would burst. The scream went on and on and on, far longer than human lungs could carry it.

When the terrible sound finally fell to silence, Nero half expected to find blood coming out of his ears. The young devil hunter looked up at the demon, an unfamiliar sensation of fear gnawing at his heart suddenly. It looked down at him, right at him, seeming to see him despite its blindness, and its bloody mouth distorted into a snarl.

Nero jerked backward from it as it reached for him with a skeletal hand, white bone curling on air where his face had been a second before.

"What do you want?" he demanded, voice ringing in the silence after the scream.

It spoke then, and its voice was a broken sob, "It hurts…it hurts…you…demon! Feel my pain!"

It lunged after him again, mismatched wings flaring behind it, and Nero scrabbled backward again, but not before the very tip of one of its skeletal talons grazed his cheek. The wound blazed as though on fire, and Nero's Devil Bringer suddenly burst into brilliance, so bright he couldn't look at it straight on.

Without his bidding, Yamato leapt into his hand, the blade singing in response to the enemy's presence. As if in reaction to the weapon's appearance, a sudden corona of light blazed to life over the winged demon's head, spiked gold energy in rotating tines.

It screamed again, this time clearly in reaction to Yamato, and made a grab for the blade. Nero parried, feeling Yamato vibrating strangely in his grip as he clutched it in his demonic hand. Quite abruptly a crossbow bolt flowered from his adversary's collar bone, and Daniele and Dave flanked him on either side, twin weapons raised at the ready.

"Nero what did you do?" Davide demanded as the demon angrily ripped the silver-tipped arrow from its chest, apparently unfazed by the holy water in which the shaft had been soaked.

"Well I wasn't going to leave it there!" he shouted back in angry defiance.

Davide growled in annoyance and fell back a step, his twin mirroring the action, as the winged being suddenly discharged a flurry of electricity in arcing bolts. The blue lightning crackled in every direction around the room and Nero had to jump out of the way in order to avoid being electrocuted by one of the charged tongues.

Daniele wasn't so lucky, and let out a sharp scream as he was struck, the force of it lifting him up to the tips of his feet before slamming him down onto the stone floor. His twin cried out in wordless desperation, unable to go to him because of the electricity that still blazed throughout the chamber.

Without even stopping to think, Nero yanked Blue Rose out of its holster and fired. The bullets sliced through the air and slammed into the demon. It almost seemed surprised, and blood oozed from the holes plugged into its chest. The nest of wasping energy dissipated and it looked at him again. Well, logically it couldn't _look_, it had no eyes, but it did anyway. Nero didn't flinch under its blind gaze. Fury and hatred and pain were etched into every line of its face, but Nero _didn't flinch._

Behind him he heard Davide run to his brother, and Cassius finally joined them, Regulus and Leone in tow, panting hard.

"We heard the screams," the young Knight explained between gasps of air.

"What in Sparda's name—" Regulus began.

It turned its attention towards them now, wings flaring outward and making it look much larger than its human-sized frame. When it spoke this time its voice was like acid, "Sparda…? In the name of Sparda? All this is in the name of Sparda…how I have been tortured in his name…!"

Abruptly it turned, and swatted Cassius out of the way with a crimson wingtip as though the young Knight were nothing more than a fly. He didn't even have time to cry out as he flew into the entrance side wall and then crumpled like a broken doll to the ground.

"You!" it screamed at Nero, "You have that sword. The demon's sword. It should be…broken! Everything is…wrong…!"

It faltered, words dallying in confusion, and clutched at its head. It stumbled and bent double, emaciated form suddenly racked with sobs. Nero took the opportunity and retreated to Cassius' side, checking to see if the youth was still alive. Regulus and Leone dragged the twins back out of the entrance to get Daniele out of the line of fire when the demon ignited into another fury.

"It's wrong…it's wrong…this is…where are they...? I can't…see…F-Fatherrr..!" it moaned, raking its fingers through its own silvery hair. Nero saw blood well up from the scalp where its bone digits sliced the skin.

And then in the blink of an eye it was on top of him, its bruised and once-beautiful face inches from his, and through its teeth it hissed at him, "You're going back. We're all going back. It's broken and I CAN'T HEAR THE STARS SINGING."

Before Nero could do anything, before he could even try to process the being's insane babbling, he was falling. And falling. And…falling. Through the stone, through darkness and through light and sound and air. The entire universe was inside Nero's eyes and he saw everything that ever was and ever could be and ever would.

He shut his eyes.

And did not see the ground before it crashed into him.

* * *

Sunlight filtered in through the stained glass windows of the Opera House. Nero was standing on the stage for some bizarre reason. He looked around, unsure how he had gotten there. What had he been doing?

As Nero went to take a step down, his eyes fell onto the sole other individual in the building. The man in blue was sitting quietly on the front pew, watching Nero with folded arms and cold pale eyes. He was young, Nero's age or perhaps a year or two older at the most. At first the young Knight thought he looked very much like himself, but then he thought perhaps the man might be one of Dante's kin. He shared their same white hair, though his expression was focused and stoic, very unlike the older devil hunter that Nero simultaneously liked and loathed.

"We have the same nose," the man said sharply, making Nero jump slightly because he hadn't been expecting him to speak first.

"What?" the youth stammered out in reply.

"The same nose," the man in blue replied, tilting his head to the side and frowning as though Nero were something stuck to the bottom of his shoe, "I didn't imagine we looked so much alike. You'd better watch out for that."

Nero scowled at him, "Who are you exactly?"

The man in blue didn't answer his question, but his pale eyes flicked toward Nero's arm for a moment before returning to the youth's face. "I thought you'd be taller, though," he said.

Nero opened his mouth to retort, but a blinding pain suddenly thrust through his head and he cried out, doubling over. Lights burst behind his eyes and through the ringing in his ears he barely heard the man in blue comment flatly, "You're waking up."

Then the room shattered into a million pieces and went dark.

* * *

Nero awoke slowly. He was on hard earth, and his right cheek was pressed against the ground, cold and, _thank Sparda,_ solid. Slowly he opened his eyes, trying to ignore the persistent throbbing in his head. The memory of the Cathedral House clung like cobwebs around his waking mind but he tried to ignore thoughts of the mysteriously familiar man in blue.

His blurred gaze was not suddenly met with blinding daylight brightness like some cliché story. In fact it was quite dark, but the world seemed to want to tilt around him when he saw it, so he squeezed his eyes shut again until the spinning stopped and just clung to the rock beneath him begging it not to throw him out into space. Gravity seemed so tenuous for some reason, though he couldn't remember why exactly…

Just as he had begun to think about it, the memory of the cell underground came back to him, and he groaned. Had the tunnel collapsed? What a fucking way to end up.

But, no…that wasn't right. Something strange had happened. He had fallen, but not because of a collapse. It was…it was…

A sound a few feet from him broke his line of thought, and he rolled over, wincing as his body protested the movement. He cracked one lid, and Cassius' form slowly swam into focus. He remembered then, when he looked at the younger Knight's body. The insane being had taken them somewhere.

He knew he should get up, make sure Cassius was alive, or examine their surroundings, but it just _hurt._ Even his eyes hurt, although he couldn't understand why. The last thing he remembered was the winged thing's face looming up towards him, screaming about…something insane, and...stained glass windows? It was a blur.

The thing that they had ridden to get here wasn't in the vicinity at least, that much Nero could sense. It must have dropped them and fled. That was a relief. Nero closed his eyes again, not able to bear the ache in them anymore.

He didn't realize he had passed out until he awoke to a light rain misting the ground around him and slowly soaking into his clothing. When Nero opened his eyes once more, Cassius was nowhere to be found. The ground wasn't soft enough for him to have left any tracks either, so there was no sign of where he might have gone. In the back of his dulled mind Nero knew that was something that should bother him, but he was just too hurt and tired to care much. If the other Knight was dead, well it didn't matter anyway. Cassius could take care of himself otherwise.

Nero rolled his eyes toward the gloomy grey sky, watching the rain fall from swollen clouds. It was impossible to tell the time of day with such heavy cloud cover. His entire body hurt, and felt sore even down to his bones.

The thought that finally roused him was of Yamato. That was something he couldn't afford to lose track of, and he forced himself to a sitting position, muscles and tendons screaming their protest to the effort. Slowly he clambered to his feet, swaying slightly but managing to keep upright. How the _hell_ had Cassius managed to get up and walk away when Nero's body was in such a state? Cassius was entirely human, as were the other surviving Knights. None of them had Nero's strength or regenerative powers.

The possibility that Cassius had being taken by someone occurred to Nero, but he wasn't sure if it was realistic. Why leave him behind and just take Cassius? It didn't make any sense, but his head hurt too much for him to think about it too thoroughly.

Carefully, he cast around the area for Yamato. The Knight hadn't realized it when he'd been lying down, but he had landed in a crater. He thought honestly that it was far too vast to have been created by his fall; it looked more like the place where a building had once stood. Nero wondered what it could have been or what could have destroyed it. There were pieces of rubble scattered here and there around the area, but it wasn't very telling.

He found Yamato a few yards away, its point buried deep into the hard ground, and it took quite a strong tug with his Devil Bringer to pull it out. Nero winced and grumbled slightly as the muscles in his arm protested quite vocally.

The rain was not helping his temper much either. Drops of it were running down his face and dripping off the tip of his nose, and it was making his white hair cling to his forehead and neck uncomfortably. Irritated, he tried to brush it out of the way to clear his face of it before giving up and deciding to pull up his hood.

Nero wanted to sit back down and just rest, but he knew that sitting out here in the rain and in the _open_ was a stupid idea. He was a little disgusted with himself for being so weak, but he was just _so tired_. Even standing upright was taking the breath out of him.

He forced himself to start walking, thinking it a better way to keep from collapsing than standing still. Yamato dragged along the ground in his hand for a moment before he stopped, realizing he still held the blade in his right hand. It seemed like it might be smirking at him, if swords could smirk.

Nero was fairly sure that if they could, Yamato would be one of them.

The devil hunter was just about to sheath the weapon within his demonic arm when a noise behind him made him turn just in time to stop a sickle-shaped blade from plunging into his abdomen.

The creature on the other end of the weapon moaned at him, ember-like eyes glowing round beneath the shadow of its tattered hood. He thought it looked sort of lost, maybe a little confused, but demons like this had little individual intelligence of their own to speak of, as far as he could judge. Deftly, he swung Yamato around in an arc and sliced the demon in half, watching in vague interest as it dissolved into sand.

In the blink of an eye he stopped the swing of a second demon by flicking Yamato across his back. The sickle glanced harmlessly off of the broad side of the katana before Nero spun and sliced the second demon, twin to the first, in two.

A third was approaching from a small distance, but Nero simply drew Blue Rose and shot it through the forehead, not even glancing in its direction as it too melted into sand. Had he more energy he might have been enjoying himself.

Nero's fingers slipped slightly on Yamato's grip, and he tightened his hand, frowning. These things went down so easily, he regretted not killing them a little more stylishly, but he just didn't have the strength to put the effort into flair. He was a little thankful there had only been three of them.

And then his blood ran cold. A song had begun in his throbbing head, one all too familiar, and he whirled around in time to see the demon that had brought him here land a few feet away. Broken chains dangled from its wrists and ankles, and the rain was beginning to soak into what remained of its clothing.

"Oh go away," Nero croaked at it, wanting to wince at the sound of his own voice.

"My wings were white," it answered inanely, letting the one with feathers still attached flair out slightly as if to make the point, "My wings were white and I could sing."

Behind it, one of the emaciated looking demons that had attacked Nero was limping up, and for a second Nero thought it might attack the thing with wings, but it stopped a few feet from it and…quailed. Nero couldn't believe his eyes.

In a flash, his kidnapper struck out with the bladed bone of its left wing and impaled the lesser demon through the eye with one of the long fingers. The sickle-carrying monster let out a surprised moan and then dissolved.

"Does my Father love me now?" it asked Nero as though completely unaware of the killing, "Would he love me if I killed you? Or your brother?"

Nero almost opened his mouth to argue that he didn't have a brother, but it didn't give him the chance. A split second later it was on him, screaming and clawing at him. Nero brought Yamato up to try to defend himself but the next thing he knew he was on his back on the ground. He didn't remember falling but he kicked up at his attacker, boots taking it squarely in the chest and sending it stumbling backward.

"What the fuck did I ever do to you?" he screamed at it, trying to stand up only to have his legs give out on him. Rain plastered his hair flat to his forehead and he brushed it back angrily, trying again to stand and managing it this time, "What do you WANT?"

"Die," it hissed, "You and everything else can die."

It lunged at him again but was brought up short by a flurry of gunfire from Blue Rose. Shielding itself with its whole wing, it fell back a step. Fresh blood darkened the already scarlet feathers, and it bared its teeth at Nero.

"Sparda's blood," it whispered, pure hatred filling its voice, "I will kill everyone in this city. I will…I will…"

It shuddered, as though fighting to keep a grip on its train of thought. Nero thought it looked like it might burst into tears in one second, or might scream in the next. Finally it shot into the air and flew out of sight faster than he could blink, and a few soiled feathers fluttered to the wet earth in its wake.

Nero bent to pick up one of the feathers that had fallen, and pocketed it quickly when he heard someone approach from behind. He half turned and saw a young man in red walking towards him, a cocky grin plastered on his face.

But as the young man got closer, the grin suddenly slid from his face and he stared at Nero. Shock was written across his familiar features as his gaze took in Nero's rain-flattened hair, blue coat, and…the sword that was nearly ready to slip out of his glowing blue grip.

"Hey…Dante," he managed to say weakly, suddenly understanding who the man in blue in his Opera House had been.

"Vergil," Dante answered breathlessly.

Nero opened his mouth to correct the other devil hunter, but quite suddenly the ground rushed up to meet him.

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

Thank you so much to all the lovely people who reviewed! You all said such nice things, and it really encouraged me to keep writing this story. I hope that you'll all continue to stick with me as this wild ride gets going.

I know bringing Dante in at the tail end was sort of a cop out, and I'm sorry. XD I fully intended to bring him in sooner but by the time he finally showed up it was at the end of the page length that I got for, so there'll be more of him next time. As usual, please review if you liked it or have any constructive criticism!

And also just a heads' up, finals are coming up for me the next couple weeks, so updates maaaay get slowed down slightly until that's over with.


	3. The Magnolia East Lounge

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

Hey guys, I've got a poll running on my profile page that pertains to this story! I'd really appreciate everyone going and answering it!

Also y'all are very lucky to get this chapter this week because I am so slacking on exam studying to get it to you. I will do my best to get one out next week as well but it most likely won't be before Friday. After this foolishness with finals is over it'll be back on track as usual, I promise!

* * *

**Mission 03: The Magnolia East Lounge**

* * *

Nero was back in the Opera House again, standing on stage just as he had been before. Why the hell was he on stage? He never went onstage here.

The man in blue was still sitting in the pews, exactly where Nero had left him. Their gazes met, and Nero said, "I'm dreaming."

"Sort of," was the chilly response.

"I've got a lot of questions."

The man in blue shrugged a shoulder noncommittally, and replied flatly, "Ask them fast. You never know when you'll wake up."

There was something in his tone that gave Nero the suspicion that he probably wouldn't answer most of the questions that were plaguing the young man's mind.

"So I'm—we're?—in…the past?" his words stumbled slightly.

"Obviously," Vergil answered dryly.

"Why are you in my dream?" Nero demanded.

"Good question," the man in blue replied unhelpfully, "But really, where else should I be?"

Nero reeled slightly at that answer, and shook his head. Vergil was Dante's brother, and Dante had mistaken Nero for Vergil so…that must mean Vergil was still around in this time? No, judging from Dante's reaction maybe not exactly. Recently…disappeared? Dante had never told Nero what had happened to his brother.

"He thinks I'm you," Nero blurted.

Vergil raised an eyebrow at him, "No he doesn't."

"He called me _Vergil_," Nero countered.

The other man rolled his eyes, looking slightly exasperated before sighing, "You really think Dante can't tell who is and isn't his own _twin? _He didn't get a good look at you. And your hair was doing something stupid."

Nero had a hard time resisting the urge to point out the fact that Vergil had basically just called his own hairstyle stupid, but he couldn't waste time. Not now. He asked, "Am I hallucinating?"

"Didn't you just say you were dreaming?" the man in blue answered cryptically.

"You're a real fuckin' treat, you know that?" Nero shot back, flexing the fingers of his Devil Bringer, "That demon thing with _wings_ thinks I'm you too."

"_It _is _insane_," Vergil pointed out, looking at Nero as though he was utterly stupid, "And it's not a demon. I would've thought you'd know the difference between a demon and—"

But the rest of his words were cut off by a ringing sound. _Ring. Ring. Riiiing._ A telephone? Nero looked around for signs of a phone, ignoring the look of contempt he got from Vergil.

Right, he must be waking up again. Shit.

* * *

An involuntary groan escaped from Nero's lips as he rolled over and quite suddenly with a taste of vertigo met the floor with a loud _THUNK!_

"Ow, fuck!" he hissed, rubbing his shoulder and trying to get his bearings. The leather couch he had just fallen off of loomed above him gloatingly and he glared at it.

"Sooo you're finally awake."

Nero's head whipped around toward the source of the voice, and he saw the young man in the red coat smirking at him from out of arms' reach. _Dante_, Nero mentally corrected himself, _That's…Dante. God he looks weird being so young._

Nero had to remind himself that this Dante didn't know him, and might not be entirely friendly. He stayed on the floor where he had fallen, surreptitiously trying to look around the room to establish the atmosphere. His weapons, including Yamato, were nowhere in sight.

"Uh…" Nero grinned weakly, "Hi?"

"So you wanna tell me who you are exactly? And what you're doing with my brother's sword?" Dante demanded, looking slightly less amused than Nero was used to.

"Nero," he answered, "I'm Nero. And, well…I was given that sword."

_By you,_ he added silently, _fifteen years in the future…give or take._

Yes, that would fly like lead.

"Bullshit," Dante accused, "I saw my brother fall. For a second you looked like him, but that's a pretty cruel trick to play on someone! Now where did you get the sword?"

Nero pinched the bridge of his nose with his human hand, trying to bite back a groan of frustration. What could he say? He didn't want to _lie_ to Dante.

"Look…this may sound a little crazy…I don't know if you've seen this bizarre looking demon—" Nero stopped abruptly, Vergil's words from his not-dream ringing in his memory. _It's not a demon._

"There's a lot of crazy looking demons running around this city," Dante cut in, titling his head to the side rebelliously, "I guess you hadn't noticed."

"It's not a demon," Nero corrected himself, frowning, "It's a…well I don't know what it is. I _thought_ it was, but…okay it's got these wings. One's got feathers and the other one is like a skeleton. It's in chains…?"

Dawning recognition darkened Dante's face, "Ah, _him._ Yeah I know who you're talking about. You're right, he's not a demon."

"What is it—he?" Nero stammered, copying the pronouns Dante had used to describe the thing.

"Answer my questions first, and maybe we'll talk about him," the man in red replied, putting his hands on his hips.

"Okay, well it…_he_ dragged me here. Back here, I guess. I'm, uh…from the future?" he answered weakly.

But to his surprise, Dante grinned at him, "Oh yeah? That's great! God damn, that's why you've got the sword! Are you Vergil's son? He gave it to you? He's alive then?"

Whatever reaction Nero had been expecting, this wasn't it, and he smiled weakly, not knowing what to say. He knew he could really use this Dante's help, as he seemed to know a lot more what was going on than Nero did, and he would probably be much more willing to divulge information than dream-Vergil, but…how the hell was Nero supposed to break such bad news to the guy?

"Well, actually you gave me the sword," he managed vaguely, hoping futilely that Dante would leave it at that.

Of course he didn't.

"And Vergil?" he prompted, sort of reminding Nero of a puppy dog that he was getting ready to kick.

"I haven't…seen him," Nero answered lamely, "Not exactly. I don't really know what to tell you…sorry."

Dante's face fell slightly, but he seemed to brush it off and replied, "Sure. Of course. So you're Nero. How do we know each other?"

"I'm not sure I should tell you," the young devil hunter answered slowly, "I don't want to like…fuck up the space time continuum or something."

The other man laughed at him, and said, "Well, where's the fun in that? Fine, fine…I won't press you. Right now, anyway."

"Why are you believing me this easily?" Nero asked, not really wanting to look a gift horse in the mouth but feeling obligated to question the other man's judgment regardless.

"Well I saw you fall, for one thing," the man in red answered, shrugged and plopping down onto the couch. Nero took that as a signal and dragged himself up off of the floor and sat down on the other end from Dante. "I didn't know it was you at the time," he amended, "but it makes sense now. And I mean…angels are notoriously known for tossing people around from place to place or time to time."

"Oh, well that's—angels?" Nero sputtered, staring at Dante incredulously.

He received a grin in reply before the other man confirmed, "Yep. You've got yourself an angel on your tail. Don't worry the shop's warded against demons _and_ angels. Unless he drops a bomb on us we should be okay in here…"

A thoughtful look crossed his face, and he looked up at the ceiling, scratching his chin, "Hmm."

"I let loose a fucking _angel?_" Nero demanded, eyes wide as saucers.

"So you're going to fixate on that, are you?" Dante sighed, and looked back at the youth, "Look, I'm sure we can deal with him. Granted he's insane, but angels aren't a bad lot generally speaking…"

"Are you crazy?" Nero snapped, "It thinks I'm your brother. It said it's going to kill everyone in this city!"

"That does seem like more of an issue," Dante agreed, though he didn't look overly concerned, "A few people have had run-ins with him, but he hasn't killed anyone _yet. _ That we know of, at least. Phone's been ringing off the hook about him but angels aren't really my specialty, ya know?"

"So you're just going to wait until it…he…kills someone?" Nero demanded incredulously.

"No," Dante sounded slightly defensive, "I'm looking for a weapon that'll actually…you know…_work_ on an angel."

"'Work'?" Nero repeated flatly.

"Yeah. Weapons that work on demons can't kill angels. Well...unless they're Fallen, and this one isn't," Dante explained.

"How he hell couldn't it be Fallen?" Nero demanded, "I mean I thought angels were like...happy and 'good will toward man' and shit like that."

"Angels are warriors," the red-coated hunter corrected him, "And trust me, I've fought Fallen before."

"Christ...how long was I out, then?" Nero groaned, "You seem like you're on top of things but I mean…if it hasn't killed anyone yet…"

"Three days," Dante provided, "And he's _scared_ people, don't get me wrong. Otherwise I wouldn't be getting calls about it. Mostly he's been killing other demons, though. I didn't really…see the issue."

"The issue is that it's fucking _insane_ and it wants to kill Sparda's blood," Nero countered, not really believing his ears, "Are you seriously saying you haven't run into it at all?"

Dante lifted his coat aside to reveal a large bandage over the side of his ribcage, dangerously close to his heart, "I wouldn't say _at all. _Every time I try to get back out into the field it starts bleeding and hurting like crazy. Makes work a hell of a lot less fun."

"I've seen you stabbed through the chest with a sword," Nero accused, neglecting to divulge that it had been he who had done it, "It healed in like…a minute. What the hell—"

Dante shrugged his coat back over the wound and for a brief second Nero caught a whiff of a cloying sweet, flesh-rotting smell before it was concealed behind the red leather once more. That just seemed impossible. Dante was the toughest person Nero had ever met, there was no way…

"I dunno what to tell you, man," Dante sighed, not looking concerned, though Nero had a feeling he was hiding it well, "Angels were made for killing demons. I may be half human, but I'm also half demon. And you're right; he _is_ out for Sparda's blood. Since he can't get at my father he'll go after me…and you too, I guess. Who was your father anyway? Or will that break the future too if you tell me. You're kinda hot. You sure you're not mine?"

Nero wrinkled his nose at that idea, and shook his head, "I doubt it. I never met my parents but I'm pretty sure you weren't involved."

"Well you've definitely got _some_ Sparda in you," Dante asserted, "You really look a lot like us."

Suddenly, Nero's stomach growled, and he grinned sheepishly. He hadn't realized how starved he was until that moment, but if he'd really been out for three days it was no wonder. Dante jumped up and grinned, "Don't worry, man. I got you covered."

He picked up a pizza box from his desk and tossed it onto the coffee table in front of the couch. Nero opened the lid eagerly, too ravenous to care how cold or stale the pizza might be. He'd never really thought about what sort of food Dante would like, but pizza made sense. Dante _would _be the kind of guy too lazy to cook anything for himself.

The young devil hunter gulped down several slices, and then paused while he was chewing the sixth, looking around the office and saying through the mouthful, "You know, this place is kind of a dive. Don't you ever clean?"

An affronted looked passed across Dante's face, and he posed in mock-offense, "How rude. This place is great. It's even got a bathroom in the back down here."

"Yeah I'll bet the rats love it," Nero replied flatly, finishing off the piece of pizza and starting on a seventh.

Behind Dante the phone rang, and the devil hunter in red grinned at Nero, "Duty calls."

He flipped the phone up off the hook and greeted cheerfully, "Devil May Cry."

Nero sighed and rested his head on the back of the couch, looking up at the water stains on the ceiling as he chewed thoughtfully on the final piece of pizza. Trust Dante to be completely flippant despite a festering wound in his chest. Nero shuddered to think what the injury must look like under the bandages.

"Got it. I'll be there in a few," Dante said before hanging up the phone and turning to face Nero again, "Okay, I'll eat my words. A local bartender just turned up dead with some of the angel's feathers scattered around it. I'm going to check it out, you game?"

"Yeah, sure. Can't have you getting hurt worse, huh, old man?" he said before realizing that he was talking to a different Dante.

"What? Old? You're probably older than me!" Dante accused with a playful grin, "How old are you, Nero?"

"Nineteen," Nero answered, scratching the back of his head awkwardly.

"Oh, well, ok then. Nevermind," the other devil hunter laughed.

"Where're my weapons?"

"Oh right, those might come in handy," Dante smiled and pointed to a back room, "They're back there. Well that big sword of yours and the revolver. Yamato's on my weapons rack. I…guess I should give it back to you."

Nero thought it looked a little challenging for Dante to give his blessing for Yamato to be taken, so he didn't say anything else about it, he just nodded and went to take the katana off the wall. After investigating the blade to make sure it was still intact, Nero absorbed it into his Devil Bringer with practiced ease.

"Now that's a neat trick," Dante observed from his position at the desk.

"Yeah I can just do it. Ever since I got the sword," Nero shrugged, not really wanting to linger on the subject too long. He swiftly crossed to the back room and had soon retrieved Red Queen and Blue Rose. His coat had been slung over the back of the couch and he quickly donned it before buckling his weapons into place.

"Ready to go?" Nero asked.

"Alright, let's rock!" Dante crowed, twirling his own sword in a flourish and sliding it into the sheath on his back with practiced ease, though Nero did not miss the small twinge of pain that passed across his face for a split-second.

* * *

Nero was not sure what exactly had made him agree to this fuckery. And yet here he was, clinging for dear life to the sides of the seat, riding bitch on Dante's shiny new second-hand motorcycle as they sped down the lane. The red-clad man had offered to let Nero hold onto his waist, but that was just a little too intimate for the teen and he didn't want to irritate the wound in the other devil hunter's chest.

That was what Nero justified it with, anyway. Honestly he was just as uncomfortable around young new Dante as he had been around old…well, old Dante. Except maybe a little bit less creeped out as this one was at least his own age.

There was just something about Dante's cocky devil-may-care personality that had always plucked at Nero's nerves, and now that he was in the man's company again he was remembering why. Well, he supposed that 'again' wasn't entirely accurate, considering that he'd never met this version of Dante before, and he was a little bit crazier—if it was even possible—than the Dante that Nero was familiar with.

The motorcycle whipped around a corner and Nero had to grip the sides of it to keep from being thrown off. The fingers of his Devil Bringer left gouges in the metal of the seat frame but Nero pretended not to notice. He hoped Dante wouldn't either.

The wind whipped his white hair into his eyes suddenly, and he had little warning as Dante braked without warning. Nero's chest crashed into the other man's back, but it hardly budged him, though he turned back to complain over his shoulder, "That wouldn't happen if you held onto my waist. C'mon, I don't bite."

Nero ignored the grin that was sent his way and muttered, "So we're here?" as he brushed his hair out of his eyes.

"Looks that way."

The young Knight dismounted from the bike and surveyed the area. This city was so different from Fortuna it was almost painful. Crowded buildings loomed over street corners here, and the grimy sidewalk was illuminated in places by spindly streetlamps which cast puddles of greasy light. Nero felt homesick.

Beside them the flickering neon of a sign proclaimed _Magnolia East Lounge._

"The hell is a magnolia lounge?" Nero asked, bemused.

"Don't ask me, ever since Bullseye Bar sunk with Temen-ni-gru I haven't been able to find a good substitute," Dante grumbled, putting down the kickstand and swinging off the motorcycle, "This place is a little swank for my taste but I get some work in the area so they've got my card."

"What's a…'Temen-ni-gru'?" Nero inquired as he followed Dante up to the entrance of the building.

"Oh, I forgot you wouldn't know about that," Dante laughed as he pulled the door open to the bar and ushered Nero inside with a smirk, "It used to be where that crater is. The one I found you in. Took out the whole city block with it. I was damn lucky it didn't get the shop too. Hey, Romilda!"

This last bit was directed at a chesty woman who met them in the foyer. Dante had been right about the place being fancy, in that decadent smoke-filled sort of way. Nero felt a little bit like he'd stepped into the roaring 20s but he kept it to himself. He turned his attention to Romilda as well. She was maybe in her forties, thick-waisted but otherwise good-looking for her age. Her shiny black hair was in a shingle style and over her sleek black dress she clutched a fur stole. Nero guessed she must be the owner of the _Magnolia East Lounge._

"It's in the back alley," she said without pause for greeting or courtesies, "Follow me."

Without another word she sashayed away across the smoky interior, and Dante followed. Nero wondered briefly what the hell was going on before he resignedly pursued them.

She led them through the kitchen and then out a door to an alleyway, illuminated by a single wavering streetlamp.

The great stain of blood was not exactly _in_ the alley as they had been led to believe. Sure, some of it had been in the alley but a lot of it was on the walls of the buildings around it and on the sidewalk and some even on the streetlight. There were pieces of clothing stuck in it here and there, as well as what might have been organs' residue.

And, sure enough, here and there were scattered tufts of the angel's plumage, black in the wavering light.

The body was human. Or it had been before it had been torn to pieces. The torso was propped against the brick wall of the building near the door they had just exited through, but Nero saw a leg on top of someone's car a few yards away, and he thought he spotted a hand on the roof of the neighboring building.

"Nasty!" Dante proclaimed, though he didn't look perturbed in the slightest, and turned to Romilda who was hovering by the exit, a handkerchief pressed over her nose and mouth, "Who did you say this used to be?"

"Marcum," she croaked through the kerchief.

"Ahh…" Dante gave the torso a closer look, crouching down and plucking a bloody feather off of its shoulder, ignoring the way his boots nudged against the string of intestines coiling on the asphalt.

Nero was finding it hard to look at the torso. He'd seen some disturbing things in his time working for the Order, and the past couple days seemed to be adding onto that total, but looking at a disemboweled half-corpse was asking a bit much. And of course, there was Dante, practically nose-to-nose with it.

His boot squelched against something and he looked down to see what looked like part of a lung.

"Oh gross," he hissed, shaking it off of his sole and grimacing. Why the hell would the angel do this to someone? What had Marcum ever done to it? Nero shuddered at the idea that if it could do this to some poor civilian, what would it do to someone it hated?

"Did anyone see what happened?" Dante asked Romilda, but she shook her head.

"There was only a scream," she whispered, "When we came outside this is what we found."

Nero doubted the man had even been able to put up a fight, judging by the force of the attack. Blood was spattered over half the wall like an explosion had set it off. There were a few footprints in the blood on the ground. One set were high-heeled like Romilda's shoes, another were flat-soled, another a clear boot pattern.

"How many people were out here?" Nero asked, "When you found him?"

"A few of us," she answered, "It was quite alarming but I have had my other employees keep everyone out of the alley for now. We don't want to lose any customers."

Nero rather thought losing customers was the least of the woman's problems at the moment, but he didn't say it aloud. He turned his attention to Dante instead, who was slipping a few feathers into his pocket.

"What's the diagnosis?" the young devil hunter asked him.

"A fucking mess, that's what," Dante answered, though he didn't seem upset about it. If anything he seemed more driven, "I'm gonna try to call in a favor when we get back to the shop later. If we're going to fight this thing we really need to be prepared for it."

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

This chapter hopefully cleared up at least a few questions people have been asking. I hope none of you are too disappointed, come what may.

Aaaaand hopefully Dante isn't too OOC. This is literally my FIRST time writing him EVER and he's sooo different from my usual character personalities it's a bit challenging to write him without second-guessing everything he says. XD

Also, I've done some sketches of the Knights from the first two chapters, if anyone is interested you can find them on my deviantart here: htt p : / / schmutzigebanane . deviant art . com / art / Knights - Sketches - 299408208

Remove the spaces obviously, ha. If the link doesn't work feel free to message me and I'll try to get it sorted out for you. I'd be interested to hear if they're vastly different from what anyone was imagining.


	4. Lady

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

Hey guys! Sorry for the wait, but I really had to scrape through that last term project. But now that summer's starting for me I should update pretty consistently unless it's a con week. But I'll be sure to warn about those. This chapter's a little bit longer than the others so hopefully that'll make up for the wait. X3

The **poll on my profile page** is still going on, so if you haven't answered it yet, please do!

* * *

**Mission 04: Lady**

* * *

The ride back to the shop after their visit to the _Magnolia East Lounge_ was grim, and Nero was relieved when they finally pulled back up to the storefront. Dante hadn't seemed to notice the gouges that Nero's hand had made in the seat, and Nero hoped he wouldn't notice for a while. He didn't feel like apologizing for something so early in their relationship.

Wait, relationship? Where the hell had that come from? Nero assumed that he must be tired, even though he had slept for three days, if Dante was to be believed. It _was_ true that he did still feel drained…

"I've got a spare room upstairs if you want to crash there," Dante offered as they made their way into the shop, seeming to read Nero's mind, "I had you on the couch to keep an eye on you when I didn't know who you were, but you're welcome to the guest room now."

The idea that the dingy little shop had a 'guest room' seemed somewhat suspicious to Nero, who had been under the impression that the place had not originally been furbished with the intention of hospitality. But, he did not complain; the idea of an actual bed was very welcoming.

"Yeah, that'd be great," he grunted, "I don't know why I'm so tired…"

"Getting dropped through time and space will do that," Dante replied, going over to his desk and picking up the hand piece. He added for Nero's benefit, "It's the door at the end of the hallway. I'd take a shower soon if I were you though; you're…a little rank."

It wasn't untrue. Nero hadn't showered in over three days; anyone would smell at least a little after that amount of time. He grinned sheepishly and asked, "Sounds like a good idea, where's the shower? And, uh, you got a washing machine around here?"

"Washing machine's in the back room," Dante pointed, "And bathroom's back there too."

"Thanks," Nero said, and headed that way.

"Don't take too long!" Dante called after him, "Hot water costs money."

Nero waved him off and went into the back area of the office. Sure enough there was a dilapidated looking laundry machine sitting next to a dryer that looked _very _much like it had seen better days. He wondered if it still worked.

There was junk of a random assortment piled up in the corners of the back room. Some old broken weapons were lying around, a smashed jukebox that probably would have really been worth something if it wasn't halfway crushed down the middle sat in one corner, and there was a pile of clothes that must have been Dante's sitting in a basket. Other miscellaneous debris cluttered the room as well, but a lot was unidentifiable. At the end of the tiny backroom was another door which Nero assumed led to the bathroom, as it was the only other door there.

Nero sighed, and unbuckled his weapons, putting them back where he had found them earlier that evening before he turned his attention to the washing machine. It was the kind that opened from the top, so he flipped the lid and started cranking wash setting dials. Nothing he was wearing was new enough to ruin anything else he was wearing so he figured it'd be okay to toss it all in together. Ever since Kyrie had moved on he'd been learning to do his own laundry.

There was a bottle of detergent sitting in the corner next to the machine, so he poured a cup inside before beginning to disrobe. He got down to his boxers and socks before realizing it might be a good idea if Dante didn't somehow walk in on him in nothing but his skivvies. He looked for a latch on the door and found none.

Well, shit.

Honestly, with his luck lately he shouldn't have been surprised. Nero could just add the other devil hunter accidentally seeing his dick to his list of new perils in this time. Quickly he pulled off his socks and tossed them in with the other clothes, and turned on the machine before slipping out of his boxers. Hastily he dropped them into the machine before closing the lid and running to the bathroom, shutting the door behind himself.

The bathroom was just as dingy and decrepit as Nero had been expecting. In one corner was the sink, and a grayish porcelain toilet barely a foot away from it. The tub was pushed as far in to the corner as possible and stood on four slightly chipped feet.

He pushed aside the moth-eaten shower curtain and climbed in. It took him a moment to figure out how to get the water flowing, but soon enough it exploded from the shower head in a steady stream and he jumped back when the icy flow struck him in the chest full on.

After a few minutes the water warmed up to a lukewarm temperature and he ducked his head under, letting it soak into his white hair. He had blood on him. He didn't know whose it was or where it had come from, but there it was.

He heard a knock at the door before it opened and Dante's voice said something. Nero pulled his head out from under the water and slicked his hair back against his head and out of his eyes. He peeked out from around the shower curtain. To be fair, it wasn't much of a curtain and the plastic was almost clear had it not been so dirty—a fact that Nero was having trouble ignoring when another person was in the bathroom with him.

"What?" he asked quickly.

Dante balked slightly, but hid the reaction quickly with a smile, "Oh, sorry. Wow I forgot how much you look like Vergil with your hair out of your face. Ha…but yeah I thought you might want a clean towel."

He held up the fluffy towel in one hand as proof of his words. The piece of cloth looked like it might be the only clean thing in the entire shop.

"Thanks."

"No prob," Dante replied, hanging the towel on an empty bar set in the wall and leaving.

Nero ignored the blush that had crept slightly up his neck thanks to the encounter. There was nothing like talking to the guy you barely knew but was letting you crash at his place anyway while completely naked with nothing but a practically clear shower curtain separating him from direct view of your naughty bits to make you realize how awkward life could get.

It didn't help either that Dante was sort of attractive in every way possible and _why was he thinking these thoughts in the shower._ He seized the bottle of shampoo sitting on the lip of the tub and angrily squeezed it onto his hair to distract himself. But once he began to scrub it into his scalp he was forced to be a little more careful. He had accidentally scratched himself enough times with the talons of his Devil Bringer while getting shampoo to a good lather to know better.

Whatever shampoo Dante used smelled really good, Nero thought as he rinsed it out. The bottle was conspicuously pink; he wondered if it was a ladies' brand. No wonder the other half-devil's hair was always so shiny.

Nero pretended to ignore the inherent gayness in that line of thought, and used the bar of yellow soap to scrub himself down. The water that washed off him and down the drain had a grayish tint and he made sure to keep washing until it rinsed off clear.

By the time he was done the water had finally warmed up to a reasonable temperature and it was with regret that he twisted the faucet off. Once the water was turned off he heard that the washing machine had finished with his clothes as well.

He grabbed the towel Dante had left for him and dried his hair before wrapping the fluffy gift around his waist and going to check on his clothes. Quickly he pulled them all from the washer and tossed them into the dryer.

Making sure the towel was secure around his waist, he walked out into the main shop, grimacing as he felt the dirtiness on the bottoms of his bare feet.

Dante was lounging in his desk chair and turned when he heard Nero's approach. He nearly fell out of the chair when he laid eyes on the other young man, but caught himself and said, "Cold?"

"A little bit, yeah," Nero answered awkwardly, "Thanks for asking."

The man in red snorted and said, "I've got something you can wear to sleep in while your clothes are drying."

"Oh yeah, that might be…good," Nero said lamely.

Dante got up and went into the backroom again, and after a second Nero followed him.

"Here you go," Dante handed him a black t-shirt and pair of what looked like track pants, "I don't usually wear underwear so…you're on your own there."

Nero could have gone quite a long time without needing that particular bit of information, but he did his best to forget the TMI and just nodded.

Once he had dried off completely and changed, he grabbed his boots and picked his way to the stairs.

"I'm gonna be making a few phone calls," Dante said, "See you tomorrow."

"Yeah," Nero nodded as he headed up, "Wake me up if something bad's about to happen."

Dante gave him a lazy salute before spinning the rotary dial and speaking to whoever answered the phone, "Hey BB, I've got an angel problem…"

His voice trailed off in the background as Nero made his way up the steps and followed the hallway. Honestly 'hallway' was a generous way of putting it. The hall was barely eight feet at a liberal measurement, just enough space to squeeze in the room he passed first, which he assumed was Dante's, and then the corner within which sat his destination.

He went inside, not expecting much. It wasn't much more than a small storage room with a narrow little bed shoved into the corner between two bookshelves and the wall. The bed frame had wheels which, on the hard wood floor, made it wiggle awkwardly under him as he sat on it. A small puff of dust arose from its surface as he put his weight on the comforter and he stood up again and tried to brush some of it loose, but succeeded only in making himself sneeze from the resultant dust cloud.

Well, it was better than nothing. At least he had a window, and that helped alleviate the room's inherent claustrophobia. Stifling a yawn, he pulled his boots off and tried to settle into dusty creaky bed. It wasn't so bad once he closed his eyes. The mattress was softer than the couch had been, and now he at least had a pillow.

Three days. He couldn't believe Dante had let him lie comatose on the couch downstairs for _three goddamn days. _ What did he tell customers?

Nero snorted slightly, and inhaled a little bit of dust which sent him sneezing again. The type of customers that actually came to Dante's shop probably didn't ask questions about conspicuous white-haired guys lying on the sofa and who might or might not be dead.

He sighed, and rolled over onto his back so as not to breathe in more dust. Dante was a puzzle wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a gaudy red leather longcoat. _That _much was very much the same as it had always been. Nero reflected that Dante and Vergil weren't really so different. Both of them were impossible to read, and neither of them could give you a straight answer about some things.

* * *

"Can you explain Temen-ni-gru, to me?" Nero demanded, standing on the stage of the Opera House.

Vergil looked a little ruffled at the abrupt demand, and arched an eyebrow, "You've got barely any time here, and _that_ is what you're curious about."

"Dante didn't explain it," Nero elaborated, "He got distracted. All he told me was that it took out a city block?"

"Did it?" the man in blue inquired, "Interesting. I was in Hell by the time it sank. Well, 'was' is a little liberal I suppose. In this time period I suppose I'm still there."

Nero went for broke and asked, "Why do I show up here to talk to you whenever I'm asleep?"

The other man didn't answer him right away, and for a minute Nero thought he wasn't going to, but finally Vergil said carefully, "Maybe, you should ask one question at a time."

Nero pushed down the urge to slap his palm to his forehead in exasperation, and instead said, "Okay. Maybe you should answer the fucking question when I _ask it the first time."_

"Don't take that tone with me," Vergil threatened, "I am sure that I can make our time together much less pleasant if you'd prefer to keep shouting profanities at me."

"What's Temen-ni-gru," Nero spat out without pause between the syllables.

"A tower," was the flat reply.

"What _kind_ of tower_,_" Nero asked with mock-patience.

"An unholy tower."

The sound of Nero's palm meeting his forehead rang out in the Opera House with a resounding _SLAP!_

Vergil looked satisfied with himself that he had sufficiently infuriated Nero, and finally divulged, "It was a demonic tower, raised to the surface of earth after being sealed away by Sparda two thousand years ago."

"Why?" Nero asked, frowning in puzzlement.

"Because I needed more power," Vergil answered stoically, as though it was the most obvious answer in the world.

Nero pinched the bridge of his nose in an attempt to stifle the confused frustration welling up in him, and asked, "Can I trust you?"

The man in blue tilted his head to the side slightly, looking somewhat surprised by the question, and said, "I wonder. It depends on what you ultimately want."

The bastard was just as much of an enigma as his brother, damn him.

"And why do I see you now, instead of dreaming normally?" Nero asked, but the room was already swimming around him and he felt himself losing touch with the Opera House's reality.

"Too late now," was the last thing he heard from the cryptic man before it went black.

* * *

Nero's eyes slid open, and he glared up at the grey ceiling. For a moment he entertained the hope of rolling over and just going back to sleep in order to continue the conversation, but the dust cloud that greeted him did not lend to the idea of further sleep once it had launched him into a sneezing frenzy.

His Devil Bringer twinged slightly, and he sat up to look at it. It was glowing a little brighter than it did normally, and he wondered if it was related to the Opera House he visited instead of dreaming. The memories of his time spent there were staying more clearly with him now. He almost felt as though he had simply walked into a different room and ended the conversation.

If only the man in blue would give him straighter answers he might be on his way to figuring some things out.

Huffing in frustration, Nero swung his legs out of the bed and got up. It had only felt like a few minutes in the strange Opera House world, but the entire night had passed; the sunlight filtering through the blinds was a testament to that. Despite himself also, Nero did feel as though he'd slept a full night. He didn't yet feel one hundred percent, but he was definitely better off.

He straightened the track pants over his waist as they had been pulled slightly askew during the night, and then tugged his boots on. He didn't trust Dante's floor to not give him tetanus or something else unpleasant. He felt exposed with just the thin layer of cotton separating his lower half from the outside world, but he did his best to brush it off. His clothes would be dry by now and he could change back into them when he got downstairs.

Dante was on the couch, several large and dusty tomes laid out before him on the coffee table. He grinned at Nero when he saw the other devil hunter and said, "Looks like you got some sleep."

"Looks like you didn't," Nero answered, heading for the back room.

"Aww," Dante waved it off, "I don't need sleep. Not while we're still trying to deal with our holy pain in the ass. Your clothes are hanging on the drying rack!"

Nero changed swiftly into familiar garb before coming back out to the main office area and saying, "Those bags under your eyes tell me you're a big fat liar. So what's with all these books?"

"A friend over-nighted them to me. We might be able to find something that'll help us out while we're trying to find an effective weapon," the man in red answered, flipping to a page which revealed a rather complicated sigil and what Nero thought might be more Enochian, like the writing that had been on the cell door.

With a jolt, he suddenly remembered Cassius. How could he have let the other Knight's missing status slip from his mind so easily? They were far from friends, but the Knights were still supposed to support one another.

"Dante," he said sharply, and the other man looked at him with something akin to surprised curiosity at the tone, "I wasn't by myself when I fell…out of the sky or whatever happened. You said you saw it. Did you see what happened to the other Knight?"

"No," Dante shrugged a shoulder. Nero noted that it was the shoulder on the opposite side of his body from the wound in his chest. "It was sort of a comet meteor type deal. I didn't see _you_ exactly, just the ball of light and then I found you where I thought whatever it was had fallen. There was someone with you?"

"Yeah…" Nero said uneasily, "A human."

"Burned up on reentry?"

Nero made a face at him and said flatly, "_No._ He wasn't moving when we…landed. But when I woke up all the way he was gone."

At that, Dante did honestly look puzzled, and said after a moment, "I hate to tell you this, but…I don't know, the Hell Prides might have dragged him off."

"The what?" Nero asked in confusion.

"The Hell Prides. Ya know…kinda confused looking, carry big scythes around," Dante elaborated, "They've been a little…well pathetic, ever since Temen-ni-gru sank. I think they don't really know what to do with themselves."

"Oh. Yeah I killed a couple of those things when I first got here," Nero divulged, "I thought they were kinda annoying."

"That's the best way to describe them," the other hunter agreed, "I don't see what else could have happened to your friend, though. If he was just plain human I don't see him getting up and walking away on his own…what, why are you making that face?"

Nero hadn't realized he was making a face until Dante had pointed it out. He just felt awful. Cassius had completely slipped his mind and the kid was only seventeen and _why hadn't Nero kept a better eye on him. _What had he been thinking when Cassius had vanished? He hadn't thought anything. He'd forgotten about the other Knight entirely and now he was probably dead.

If he hadn't been dead already.

Nero tried to recall if Cassius had been responsive the first time Nero had regained consciousness. He thought the kid might have been breathing but he just…couldn't remember.

"Dammit," he cursed, letting his forehead sink into the palm of his human hand, "This is my fault. If I hadn't pulled out that stupid power box in the cell none of this would ever have happened."

"Well," Dante interjected, "I wouldn't be too hard on yourself, Nero. Shit like this tends to go down no matter what you do. That angel didn't deserve to be locked up wherever he was, no matter what he's doing now. We're probably going to have to kill him, sure. But that's still better than whatever torture chamber you found him in. Trust me, I saw him with my own eyes.

"And besides," he added with a grin, "You can't say this isn't interesting as hell."

Nero looked at the other man with incredulity, but before he could say anything else, the phone rang. Dante got up to answer it, flipping the receiver up off the desk with a flourish and greeting, "Devil May Cry."

Whatever the person on the other line was saying to him seemed like it was good news, judging by the elated expression that flashed across Dante's face. When he hung up he turned to Nero, beaming, and said, "My favor just came in. I've got a friend who makes it her job exterminating rogue angels. She says that there used to be an angel blade in the city. Doesn't know if it's still here, but it's our best shot right now."

"Ok, where is it?" Nero asked, feeling a 'but' coming.

"Well, according to her, it's in a Cathedral of the Sacred Heart," Dante said, "Trouble with that, there's at least three within the city limits. It's a pretty…popular church name."

"Shit," Nero swore.

"Yeah pretty much," Dante agreed, though the grin had not yet slipped from his face, "So I'm gonna call for some backup and we can split the work between the three of us."

"Ignoring the fact that I have no idea where anything is in this city," Nero pointed out, "Sure, sounds great."

"I'll get you a map," Dante said as he began dialing the rotary, "There's one maybe eight blocks from here. If you don't mind a little walk you can take that one."

"Sure…sounds super," Nero muttered as whoever Dante had dialed answered the phone. While the man in red chatted up whoever it was, Nero turned his attention to the old TV he had just now noticed. It sat on the floor in the corner, looking neglected and forlorn.

He pushed some of the books to the side to make room on the table, and then picked up the heavy old television and set it down in front of himself. Nero turned one of the knobs, vaguely sure that it would turn on the machine, and was relieved to see the screen fizz to snowy life. With the air of someone uncovering an ancient relic from an archaeological dig, Nero carefully adjusted the aerial until the screen cleared up.

It was some sort of cartoon, but that wasn't what he was looking for. Carefully he turned the dial to change the channels until he reached a news station. The newscaster was talking about something about school funds, and Nero had no idea what else. He sighed and turned the TV off. He didn't know what he'd been looking for exactly. Breaking news about a winged being attacking people on the street? News about a teenager in a white longcoat killing demons with a big ass sword that happened to fire bullets?

Normal news probably didn't broadcast about things like that, Nero thought. This wasn't Fortuna. Not everyone believed in demons here, did they? He wondered how that tower, Temen-ni-gru, that both Dante and Vergil had been so vague about had affected the people in this city.

"What's on your mind?" Dante asked, making Nero jump. He hadn't noticed the other man hang up the phone and come back over to the couch until he had spoken.

"I dunno," he shrugged, "It's just different here. Back in Fortuna…where I come from, demons are sort of a fact of life. Well, they were. Things have been really quiet lately…it's just, weird here. Does nobody notice?"

"Well, some people notice," Dante said with a shrug, sitting down beside him on the couch again, "I think _most_ people notice, actually. There's a different between noticing and acknowledging though. But hey, why make the regular people acknowledge when it's our job to keep them safe anyway?"

Nero didn't really know if he understood or agreed with that entirely, but he gave a half-hearted nod anyway. "So this angel blade thing, that's what'll kill it?"

"Probably," Dante answered, "We don't get a lot of angels in these parts who aren't Fallen, so it'll be an interesting challenge."

"Why won't regular weapons work?" Nero inquired.

"I imagine because it'd be sort of difficult for angels to get all smitey if you could just shoot them," the man in red laughed, "Demonic weapons hurt them but BB says only an angel-made weapon can kill an angel."

"BB?"

"Angel expert," Dante elaborated blandly, "The one who's been giving me all these useful books. She's kind of a bitch but hey, if the intel works out who cares?"

Nero picked up one of the aforementioned books and turned it over, frowning, "How are these supposed to help?"

"Well if we can't kill him, we'll want a backup plan," Dante answered, and Nero could almost hear the silent 'duh' at the end of the statement.

Nero put the book back down and sighed in annoyance, "So how long 'til your friend gets here and we can go looking for that blade?"

"She'll get here in her own sweet time," Dante answered, leaning back against the couch and putting his hands behind his head, "Can't be too far though. She was in town when she picked up."

"You seem to know a lot of women," Nero observed, thinking of Romilda from the _Magnolia East Lounge._

"What can I say?" Dante answered with a sigh, "Ladies love me."

From his position, Nero could see the bandage on the other man's chest, and he could smell the sickly sweet odor from before.

"Dante," he said sharply, "You change the dressings on that wound, right?"

"Yeah, changed 'em right before you got up, why?"

"It just…smells," Nero explained.

"Yeah, I'd noticed, thanks," Dante snorted.

"Well I mean, do you think there's something like, I dunno, poisoned in there?" Nero ventured.

"There was a fragment of bone from the wing that stabbed me," he provided boredly, "But I dug it all out."

"All of it?" Nero pressed.

"Pretty sure," Dante said slowly, though he sounded less sure than he had a moment ago.

"Do you mind if I take a look at it?" Nero asked, not really wanting to, but he thought if his sudden hunch was right there was no way around it.

But before Dante could give his assent or disagreement, the door to the shop opened and a young woman walked in.

"Later, yeah," Dante said quickly to Nero before getting up and greeting her, "Hey, Lady. That was quick. Long time no see."

She looked young, Nero thought. Probably younger than Cassius had been, but she looked much tougher than the other Knight too. Though she was dressed in what looked like a schoolgirl uniform, she was armed to the teeth. Nero thought, just by her expression it would be a stupid demon that crossed her, and this was only enhanced by the _rocket launcher_ strapped to her back.

"Hey, Dante," she said, her expression unchanged, "You said you'd got a job for me."

"Yeah, it's not a huge thing but it'll be a big help. I'm sure you've seen the big guy flying around town," he answered with a smirk.

"He threw one of my shells back at me like it was nothing," she growled, pulling up one sleeve to show an angry red burn under the white fabric, "I barely got away from the explosion in time. _What_ is a demon like that suddenly doing around here now that Temen-ni-gru's sunk?"

"There've always been demons around, Lady," Dante laughed, "That's not going to change. But he's not a demon anyway. He's an angel."

"So what," she was unimpressed, "You've fought angels before. Why do you need me?"

"I've fought Fallen before," Dante corrected, "This one's still got his holy juice. His shazam. Whatever."

She scowled at the clarification, and crossed her arms, "I'm not helping you kill an angel. I hunt _demons."_

"It's already killed a human," Nero interjected, unable to contain himself anymore, "Maybe more than one. We don't know. It's…_he's_ insane. There's no stopping him."

The girl looked at him as though she had just now noticed him. Her nostrils flared in surprise and she opened her mouth, merely gaping for a brief second before Dante cut across her.

"Lady, Nero. Nero, Lady," he said, foreseeing a mistaken identity waiting to happen and clearly trying to preempt any explosive anger, "Nero's a friend from…out of town. Came when the angel showed up."

Nero could tell Dante was choosing his words carefully in front of Lady. Whatever Dante had readily believed from Nero, it looked like this girl would be much more difficult to convince. He kept his mouth shut and let the other devil hunter do the talking.

"Another demon, then?" she asked coldly, frowning at Nero and his Devil Bringer and with a start he realized she had mismatched eyes.

"No, Nero's a mutt, like me," Dante grinned, "Totally harmless."

"Yours and my definitions of harmless are different, in that case," she said flatly, though it was clearly sarcasm that had colored Dante's last statement.

Nero stood up, running his human hand through his hair awkwardly before offering it to shake. She looked at it for a moment and then sighed in exasperated defeat and shook it firmly.

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

Hope the wait was worth it! Yet another canon character I'm trying to keep IC. And just for reference, I'm basing her most on her personality in DMC3, not the anime or DMC4 (obviously, lol). I think her personality in the anime really leaves something to be desired a lot of the time, sooo...yeah.

I've also posted another artwork, more of sketch really. If anyone was interested in what the angel looks like in my head, here it is http:/ / schmutzigebanane . deviantart . com / art / My-Wings-Are-White-301522024

As usual, please review if you enjoyed, or even if you didn't! I need reviews like I need air! ;D


	5. The Bell

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

Ok, mostly back on regular schedule now, lol. Sorry for the wait. I meant to update a bit earlier but lost track of time working on cosplay. XD

If you haven't yet taken part in the **poll on my profile page** please do so as this is the last week it'll be up. Thank you!

* * *

**Mission 05: The Bell**

* * *

"You look an awful lot like this idiot and his brother," Lady admitted once their handshake had concluded, "It threw me off for a minute. There's no way you two aren't related…"

Dante coughed awkwardly and Nero scratched the floor with the toe of his boot, both men avoiding her eyes now.

She huffed and threw up her hands in a shrug, "Fine, whatever. None of my business anyway. What's the job, Dante?"

"We're looking for a weapon," he explained, leaning against the edge of his desk, "An 'angel blade'. My source says it's in a Cathedral of the Sacred Heart somewhere in town. Trouble is there's at least three of them and we don't really know what the weapon looks like. It'll save a lot of time and trouble if we can split up the search three ways."

"Your 'source' couldn't be more specific?" Lady asked flatly.

"Her memory isn't always the best when it comes to these things," Dante shrugged.

Lady snorted and shook her head, "I would've thought by now you'd steer clear of that gun-slinging witch. Last time her info got you into some deep shit didn't it?"

"What can I say? I'm a sucker for a pretty face. And besides, I didn't say the angel blade would be easy to get to," Dante countered, "Booby trapped at least, I'm sure. But hey, you don't have to do it if you don't think you can handle yourself, babe."

"_Don't_ call me 'babe', Dante," she growled at him.

He held up his hands in mock-surrender, and continued, "Nero here's gonna take the church on Fifth. That leaves, that I know of, the one on Pemberton and the one on West Way. Any preference?"

She thought about it for a moment before replying, "The one on West Way is closer. I'll take that one."

Dante nodded and then opened a desk drawer, laying a map of the city out flat and gesturing for Nero to come closer, "Like I said, yours is about eight blocks from here."

He pointed to a space on the map, "This is where we are, okay? Follow the street east, past however many intersections there are until you get to Main Street. Turn right and follow it 'til Fifth. Shouldn't be hard from there; you can see the bell tower from the corner. Got it?"

Nero mentally reviewed the instructions and then nodded, "Got it."

"Alrighty. Lady, you know where you're going, we'll all meet up back here if it's a bust and then plan from there. Lady, you've got a mobile phone if something happens. Nero?"

Nero shook his head, "No, not with me at least."

"Alright, alright," Dante said, "No problem. I've got some hand-held radios around here somewhere. Lady, maybe it'd be a good idea for you to take one too, just in case…"

He pulled open several drawers in the desk and came up empty before retreating to the back room, leaving Nero alone with Lady for a moment.

"So how did you two meet?" Nero asked awkwardly.

"He caught me falling off the Temen-ni-gru and I shot him in the face," she answered blackly, "You?"

"I kicked him in the face and stabbed him through the chest when he shot someone I knew," Nero replied without thinking, and then quickly amended, "Don't bring it up though. He hasn't done it…uh…doesn't remember it happening…"

She narrowed her eyes and gave him a shrewd look with that piercing mismatched gaze of hers, but was interrupted from further inquiry when Dante returned carrying three walkie-talkies.

"Here," he said, tossing one to Nero and then one to Lady before hooking the third onto his belt.

"Once you get your weapons out of the back we'll be ready to go, Nero," he said pointedly.

Not needing to be told twice, Nero headed for the back room to retrieve Red Queen and the Blue Rose, strapping the holster for the gun back onto his hip and doing the same for the Queen's sheath.

"Alright, let's party," Dante crowed when Nero emerged into the main room.

The three demon hunters exited the building, Nero's companions made a beeline for the two motorcycles parked in front of the shop. He noted that Lady's looked better-kept than Dante's.

"See you back here!" Dante called over the roar of the engines as they kick-started.

Nero waved and gave them both a thumbs-up before the two sped away, leaving him alone to walk. With a sigh, he shoved his hands into his pockets and started walking.

The trudge wasn't too long, but long enough for Nero to wish it was shorter. It was also uneventful, which he wasn't sure was a good thing or not. It would be fun to kill some demons, sure, but uneventful also meant that the angel wasn't on his tail, which was good…

…unless that meant it was going after Dante or Lady.

Nero tried not to think about it and made his way for the cathedral entrance. The church was massive, beautiful white stone with stained glass windows and spires and flying buttresses. The cathedral was unparalleled by any other building that it shared the block with, and Nero couldn't help but stop and admire it for a second. Now _this…this_ reminded him of home.

Finally, after a moment more of dawdling, he pushed the door open and went inside. The sunlight filtered through the stained glass in the sanctuary, and he looked around, still feeling slightly awed by the building.

He didn't know much about Christian churches, but the building was so much like some in Fortuna that he wondered if the people who worshipped here were very different from those in the Order.

And, there was someone sitting in the front pew, hunched over slightly as though asleep. Nero frowned, and started walking up the aisle, one hand on Blue Rose cautiously. As he reached the front, he saw it was…but no, it couldn't be—

"Cassius?" Nero gaped.

The young man looked up at him, and shut the bible he had been reading with a resounding _snap!_

For a second, he seemed not to recognize Nero, but then his face broke into a weak grin, "Nero. I _thought_ if I waited here long enough, something would happen."

"What are you doing here?" Nero demanded, relief that the other Knight was still alive overriding his thoughts on the current mission objective for a moment.

"I don't really know," the younger man shrugged, and waved the book under Nero's nose as if it was an answer, "But I like it here. It's like home, but without the demonic pretense. Did you know, these people don't have a regular name for their god? They just call him…God!"

He laughed at that, and Nero thought he looked very, very tired, and not just a little unbalanced. He looked as though he'd gotten none of the sleep Nero had, and briefly the half-devil wondered if the boy had spent all his time in the church reading that bible.

"Cassius, there're dangerous things going on," he said, unsure how to treat the other Knight, "That thing we found in the lab…it's an angel."

Cassius looked at him levelly, and Nero saw the deep circles under the young man's eyes, "What do you need me to do?"

"Does your book tell you anything about angels?" Nero asked delicately, pointing to the bible.

"It says…a lot of things," Cassius said slowly, putting a shaking hand against his forehead and frowning as though his head ached, "What's going on…Nero? Sometimes I think this is a dream. My head throbs and I can't sleep, or I'll see horrible things. The Father…there's a Father here…I don't know whose but everyone calls him that…the Father says that God must have brought me here. Where did God bring you?"

"I don't know about God," Nero answered, "But I ended up with Dante. He's that devil hunter that started the whole fiasco that unveiled the Order's true intentions. We're…in the past, Cassius. The angel took us backward in time."

The younger Knight looked at him blankly for a moment, and Nero was about to repeat himself before the brunette said, "Oh. I see."

"I'm looking for a sword," Nero said slowly, trying to make the words sink in, "Well, I _think_ it's a sword. It's a weapon that will kill the thing that brought us here. It's killing innocent humans, do you understand?"

He felt that the continued use of the term 'angel' in Cassius' current state might be a bad idea. If he had latched into this religion here then doing anything to antagonize it would be dangerous. Nero didn't know much about the religion, but he knew enough to tell that angels were pretty important to it. Talking about killing one might not go over too well.

"A sword. Or a weapon. In the church?" Cassius clarified. Nero could tell that he was doing his best to understand through the sleep-deprived fog.

"Yes," nodded Nero, "A…holy weapon? Something made by angels."

"Well, the Father sometimes talks about Remiel's Bell," Cassius offered, "I don't know if it's a weapon but I thought it sounded odd."

"A bell?" Nero asked, "Where?"

"The south tower," Cassius said, standing slowly and picking up his sword from the floor beside him, sliding it into its sheath, "I'll take you there."

Nero could see that, despite the utter exhaustion written clearly in every line of the younger man's form, Cassius' instincts and training as a Knight of the Order of the Sword were winning out. That much was reassuring. Nero hoped it meant Cassius was okay.

Together they made their way to the bell tower. Nothing else stirred in the cathedral and Nero wondered where everyone else was. It was the middle of the day; didn't that mean there would be people around? Or, was that only in the mornings?

"Where is everyone?" he asked, curiosity getting the better of him.

"I think Father is in his study," Cassius shrugged, "There are a few…oh I can't remember what they're called…apprentices? Oh! Acolytes, yes. There are a few of them around but I don't know where. Mostly they've left me alone…"

They had reached the door to the tower stairs, and there Cassius hesitated, making Nero remember the other Knight's fear of heights.

"You can wait down here," Nero offered, and didn't miss the look of relief on the other Knight's face, "I'll look for myself."

Cassius nodded quickly, and Nero opened the door to the stairs, hurrying up them and pulling out his walkie-talkie as he made it to the top.

"Dante, Lady, can you hear me?" he said, holding down the press-to-talk button.

As he waited for a reply, he walked toward the bell. The sun reflected off of its silver surface and the wind whistled under it at a faintly musical pitch.

Suddenly the radio crackled in his hand and Dante's voice came through, "I can hear you Nero. What's up?"

"I found Cassius—the other Knight I was telling you about. He's been here at the church the whole time. And he told me about this bell, here. It's called Remiel's Bell?"

"Oh yeah, I've heard of that bell," Dante said, surprising Nero slightly, "I think it's sort of new. I mean as far as bells go. There was a huge buzz about it last year when they got it installed."

"I'm taking a look at it right now," Nero answered, "I'll let you know how it goes. Over and…out, I guess."

"Alright, over and out."

Nero put the walkie-talkie back into his pocket and looked at the bell. It was about as high as he was tall, and twice as thick around. And, once he looked closer, he saw the symbols around the bottom edge. Enochian again?

He reached out with the Devil Bringer and touched it, and let out a shout of pain and surprise as it burned and let off a flash like a firecracker, tossing his demonic hand backwards away from it with quite some force. The bell rang out in a on off-key pitch, as though in vocal protest to the touch, and Nero realized that it must be reacting to the devil in him.

"What's wrong?" Cassius' voice was sharp behind him, "I heard you shout."

His grey eyes flashed to the still echoing bell, and then to Nero's Devil Bringer, the hand of which was still smoking slightly.

"Oh," he said, face falling. It was the most tragic syllable Nero had ever heard uttered from a human mouth, as though something had just broken Cassius' heart into a million shattered pieces. And then, before he had time to react—before he could register what was happening, the human raised his gun-blade and shot Nero through the chest.

At first, he thought the younger Knight had missed, but then…he was falling backwards. The air flew passed him, but he didn't see the ground when it rushed up to greet him; only the figure in white watching him fall from over the edge of the bell tower.

* * *

There was no Opera House. There was no Vergil.

There was only blackness and silence and the taste of oblivion on Nero's tongue. The abyssal darkness yawned all around him and he was so deaf he could not even hear his own screams. It pinned him in unfeeling cold, no sensation, no pain, no light, nothing but black empty space. There was not even up or down.

His soul was naked, laid bare and shivering to the nothingness.

An eternity passed as he was held captive by the dead void with only his silent screams to keep himself company.

* * *

Nero crashed to his knees on the stage, feeling his knees cry their protest at the sudden jar, but he welcomed the pain. All around him the vibrancy of the Opera House glowed and thrived and he sobbed uncontrollably, shaking on the floor and unable to move for some time, so overcome was he with relief and sense shock.

Finally, he felt a hand on his shoulder, and he looked up to see Vergil standing over him. "You tasted the void," Vergil said after a moment, "I would guess that was why your fellow Knight has been avoiding sleep."

Nero rubbed a hand across his face to wipe away the tears and whispered, voice cracking, "What…why is…" But he couldn't seem to put together a coherent sentence. His tongue was leaden and clumsy in his mouth.

Vergil removed his hand from Nero's shoulder and explained, "You have me in your inner world because…my spirit embodies Yamato. I can keep you out of the void. The other boy—he doesn't have a sentient Devil Arm. You don't belong in this time period, that's why you don't dream. That would be my guess, at least."

"You know an awful lot," Nero observed.

"I read," the man in blue answered, and Nero wasn't sure if it was a joke or not, before he added, "But try not to get knocked around so much. It's harder to keep you in our inner world when you get thrown off buildings."

"That bastard, Cassius," Nero growled, "What's he thinking!"

"Anything but clearly," Vergil answered, "You saw him. He hasn't slept since he got here. I would kill him now and put him out of his misery, were I you."

"I'll take it under advisement," Nero replied sarcastically as he felt himself waking up, and added before the room vanished, "Thanks, Vergil."

He didn't get to see the other half-devil's expression, but he hoped it was one of annoyance.

* * *

Pain blossomed in his chest as he became aware of the world around him once more. The grass under his back was soft but he knew it hadn't been enough to break the fall from so high. Nero lay there and let his demonic body knit itself back together. The broken bones were easy, but the bullet that burned in his chest was a larger problem. It would probably have to be dug out before the wound would heal.

He could see the bell tower from where he laid, sun glinting off of Remiel's Bell gloatingly. The sun hadn't changed position, so he must not have been unconscious for long. Something rustled in the grass behind him, and Nero tilted his head back to see the pair of boots, and further up the person attached to them.

Cassius looked down at him with an almost blank expression now, and pointed the end of his gun-blade at Nero's forehead, "He said that you were a devil. I didn't believe at first, but it's true isn't it? You're just another monster hiding behind the Sword."

The words stung, but Nero would be damned if he let Cassius see that. "Maybe so, but I haven't killed any innocent people," he growled in reply, "Maybe you should ask your angel friend what it's been doing with its spare time."

"He's not my friend. He just helped…he said he can make me sleep," the younger man croaked, tilting his head to the side and letting his gaze travel upward to the sky, "I said no because he wanted you and your friend Dante in exchange. But now I see he was right. Only a devil would be burned by the holy bell."

"I'm surprised you and the winged asshole can string together a coherent thought between the two of you," Nero replied tartly before he could stop himself.

Cassius surprised him with a grin, and for a moment Nero thought he looked almost normal again when he agreed, "Yeah, me too."

Then there was the sound of wings, heavy and foreboding on the wind. The angel landed in front of him, looking as ragged and bloody as ever. An air of misery clung to it like a fume, but it focused on him, and when it spoke it was with lucidity—how permanent Nero didn't know.

"You've been hiding," it spat, "But I was right. You demons always crawl out of your holes in search for power. Especially _you._ Never satisfied with what was rightfully yours, were you? Sparda's _get."_

It spat out the last sentence with particular venom, reminding Nero all too strongly that it thought he was Vergil.

And then it lunged, moving faster than Nero could blink. It was _so fast_. He had forgotten the shock it gave his senses for the angel to be a breath away in less than the blink of an eye. Nero was on the ground, he couldn't get out of the way of it, not with Cassius and the threat of a bullet to the brain behind him—

Nero moved. Rolling to the side he just barely dodged impalement on one of the angel's barb-like wing pinions, and then he kicked upward and around in a movement that would have made the greatest break dancer this side of the Atlantic green with envy. The heel of his left boot caught Cassius under the chin and sent the Knight flying backward onto the sidewalk, where he landed with an unpleasant crunch and lost half the skin on his jaw to the cruel pavement.

But Nero hardly paused to keep track of that. He used the momentum from the kick to spring backwards and somersault into a crouched position, whipping Red Queen from her sheath just in time to parry another swipe from the angel's skeletal appendage.

The bone made a sound like nails on a chalkboard as it scraped across the blade, and Nero winced at the noise as well as the feeling of the bullet burning in his breast. The angel let out a scream and pressed forward. Behind him, Cassius groaned and got up to his knees slowly, wiping blood from his cheek onto his sleeve and leaving a red stain on the once pristinely white uniform.

The Devil Bringer burst into bright brilliance without warning, and Yamato leapt forth into his right hand.

'_Let me,'_ a voice, Vergil's, spoke through the blade. Nero felt power coursing out of Yamato and up through his demonic arm. It was different then it had been in the past; he had always sensed the sentience of the sword, but the sheer power of its individuality was almost deep enough to drown in now.

It was so difficult for Nero to resist the impulse to let himself sink beneath the surface and let that powerful sentience wash over him. The day that he had first met Yamato flashed across his memory, and he remembered that feeling when the sword had nearly overcome him. When, he now realized, Vergil had nearly overcome him.

Yamato sang in his hand as he swung it. It sliced through the angel and through the building behind it, sending an explosion of stone and dust out into the air before crashing into the earth. The aura of blue had encased Nero like a flame, crackling with furious energy as the phantom figure loomed behind him like a silently vengeful guardian.

Blood exploded from the slice the Devil Arm had made in the angel, and it staggered backward, the visible part of its face twisting in pain and rage.

The sound of an engine roared around the corner, and Lady skidded to a halt a few yards away. Her eyes widened as she took in the scene and Nero's Devil Trigger, but she didn't hesitate. She leapt off of the bike and cut off Cassius as he made to swing at Nero's back, catching the gun-blade's edge against her Kalina Ann. She broke his stance by twisting the rocket launcher around and making his blade slide off to the side, and then finished by delivering a powerful roundhouse kick to his gut which sent him flying backwards.

"Dante's on his way!" she shouted over her shoulder to Nero, who hadn't taken his eyes off of the angel as it had begun to circle. "I was closer so he told me to come on ahead when you didn't get back to him on the radio!"

Nero nodded, but said nothing. The angel was still circling, like a predator trying to gauge how much fight its prey had in it still. Its wings were bleeding—the bone as well as the feathered. Blood was seeping out not unlike sap from a tree, making the white bone glisten red, and darkening further the already bloodstained feathers of the other wing.

"What did you do to him?" Nero demanded, pointing backwards to Cassius. His voice sounded strange in his own ears through the rippling blue energy. Behind him, the other Knight picked himself up, and spat. Lady was ready for a second assault, but he made no move to attack her now, instead taking a few steps back.

The angel did not answer him. Nero had not honestly expected it to. The blood seeping out of its wings seemed to be affecting it, and it staggered, letting out a grating snarling sob.

"Get out of my face, then!" Nero screamed at it, rage making the azure aura around him flare.

Then he saw movement behind the angel—Cassius fleeing past it back to the cathedral. For a second he didn't understand what was going on, but then he saw the bloody grin break across the angel's face.

"No! He's going for the bell!" Nero shouted to Lady, who needed no second telling and ran for the church. She didn't cry out as the angel's wing hit her in the back, sending a spray of feathers flying, but she let out a grunt when she collided with the cement. But then she was up again, sprinting headlong after the other Knight and disappearing after him through the cathedral doors.

"My bell," the angel said, its voice almost friendly, sounding not unlike a songbird's lilt, "It's my bell. He found it. And _you cannot have it!"_ The last sentence was a low and violent snarl that echoed inhumanly in the open air.

It charged Nero then; hands extended like the talons of a hawk, and nearly knocked him off his feet. But, he held his own. He'd seen the lucidity cracking and he was sure it would fly off if it broke just a little more. It was suffering inside its own body—couldn't stand it—Nero could see that. It almost made him feel sorry for it.

Almost.

"Yeah it would be a bell," Nero grunted, dodging to the side and barely avoiding another stabbing wing bone, "Sorry for the pun but you _are_ pretty bats in the belfry."

_That_ had sounded like something Dante would say, he realized in the back of his mind. He hoped the other devil hunter's recklessness wasn't going to rub off on him too. Nero didn't really need more holes in him.

The bell let out a bright tragic peal then, and both Nero and the angel froze at the sound of it. Cassius stood in the bell tower, silhouetted against the sun, his lips pressed against the bell's body. Then he was just…gone. And the bell was gone too.

Lady burst out onto the empty bell tower a second later, looking angry and bewildered. Nero looked back at the angel, but it was gone too, leaving only the smell of stale blood in its wake.

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

Yeah I know…Cassius is back. I'm sorry if anyone was hoping he'd be gone for good, but well, I've got plans for him. I hope ya'll can handle that. XD I swear I don't plan on making him the focal point of the story, but hey we need a little drama/conflict right?...Riiight?

And speaking of the sucker, here's another piece of art

http: / / schmutzigebanane . deviantart . com /art /Cassius-302212034

As always, please pleeaaaase review!


	6. Reprieve

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

Sorry this chapter is a bit shorter than usual. I've been at a friend's house this weekend and I didn't want to not post anything, so I hope you guys will be ok with this. XD

* * *

**Mission 06: Reprieve**

* * *

By the time Lady had descended the tower and come back out to meet him, Nero had sunk onto the grass again, trying to catch his breath. Yamato was sheathed in his arm again, and his Devil Trigger had gone back to rest. The bullet in his chest was making itself very much known now, and he hoped it hadn't travelled deeper.

"What the hell just happened?" Lady demanded angrily as she stalked back to him. Her lip was busted and she was bleeding from the nose, "Who was that I just chased after? He was human, wasn't he?"

Nero nodded, keeping a hand over the hole in his chest out of reflex, "Cassius. He sort of hunts demons too I guess…I thought he was on our side, but…"

Further interrogation was interrupted by Dante's timely arrival. He gave them both an expectant look as he dismounted from the bike, and then sighed, "Aw man, I missed it, didn't I?"

"Just barely," Nero grunted sorely, "We could have used you. They took the weapon. It was disguised as a church bell and they took it because…I couldn't _touch_ the damn thing."

He held up his singed Devil Bringer as proof, scowling.

"It was coordinated," Lady added, her arms were folded across her bust and her expression was thunderous, "That angel might be insane, but he's still smart when he's not delirious. They managed to keep us tied up before Nero's 'friend' went for the bell."

"Cassius is _not_ my friend," Nero snapped at her, "He never was. He's just an acquaintance. Now he's an enemy, I guess."

The bullet in his chest was aching something fierce and he couldn't concentrate. The longer they argued over this bullshit the farther away Cassius and that damnable angel got with the angel blade…bell…whatever the hell it was.

"Okay," Dante said, running a hand through his white hair and repeating, "Ooookay. Okay. Okaaay. Okay."

It was like a mantra, Nero thought. Every time Dante said the word it was with a different inflection. He was trying not lose his shit over the fact that their best lifeline had just vanished into thin air, along with two very dangerous (though that was debatable on at least Cassius' part) and unhinged individuals.

"Well," Lady interrupted finally, "Nero's injured. And Dante, you don't look so great either. We should regroup at the Devil May Cry and go from there."

It was true; Dante did not look in top form. Nero thought he might have run into some trouble of the demonic variety on his ride over. There was blood on his boots and on his sword. His face was ashen, and there was a steady ooze of foul-smelling blood trickling from beneath the bandage on his chest.

"Yeah," Nero agreed after a second, "We should. We have no idea where they might've gone right now and…it's not gonna do much good if we go after them right now anyway."

The three of them rode back to the shop, Nero on the back of Dante's bike once more. This time he did hold onto the other man's waist, though he was careful of the wound in Dante's chest. Nero was afraid he might fall off if he didn't; he was feeling a little lightheaded after all that had happened. The Devil Trigger probably had not helped matters.

When they reached Devil May Cry, Lady left them with the explanation that she had done her part and had other things to do, and that they should call her if they needed her, but not to expect her to help them out for free next time. Nero wasn't sure what "free" meant, but he couldn't quite believe she wanted money out of them. There was no way Dante was doing any better than scraping by, and only a complete cunt would try to squeeze blood from a stone.

Nero flopped onto the couch, and Dante followed not far behind. Both of them were hurting, there was no doubt about that.

"Okay," Dante said after a second, "Let's take a look at that hole in your chest."

"I thought that was my line," Nero joked lamely, but he unzipped his hoodie all the same.

"I can wait," the other devil hunter assured him, "Getting out bullets takes priority, trust me. Who shot you?"

"Cassius," grunted Nero in reply as he pulled his shirt up to reveal the hole in his sternum. It was a little awkward, baring his chest to the other man like that, but he tried not to show his embarrassment.

"Ah okay. Well at least he's not dead, right? I was wrong," Dante joked as he brought out a first aid kit. The container looked a bit dubious in Nero's opinion, but he kept the opinion to himself.

Dante retrieved a forceps from his dingy little aid kit, and turned back to Nero saying, "Okay, this is gonna be…well I don't have to tell you I guess."

Nero tried not to make a sound when the other man started digging into the hole in his chest with the forceps, but he couldn't bite back the growls of pain for very long. When Dante finally pulled the lump of metal out, Nero collapsed back against the couch, panting in relief as he felt the hole in his chest begin to knit itself back together.

"I'm surprised I had to fish it out," Dante commented, turning the bullet over and looking at it with puzzled interest, "Normally when I get shot I just spit the bullets out and that's that. Your demonic powers are different from mine, I guess."

"I guess," Nero agreed hoarsely, grabbing some of the gauze from the kit and using it to wipe away the blood from around the newly closed wound, "Now, let me have a look at yours, will ya?"

"Maybe later," Dante protested, "We need to get out in the field and kill some things."

"Stop making excuses," Nero replied, "We have no idea where the angel and Cassius went, and until they show up again, there's nothing we can do. _Don't make me hold you down."_

He flexed the fingers of his Devil Bringer along with the threat. Dante sighed and flopped back onto the couch, waving a hand airily, "Sure, sure. Just be gentle with me."

Nero rolled his eyes at Dante's last statement and leaned forward to unpeel the bandages from the other man's chest. The smell was even more unpleasant now that it was freed into the open air, and Nero grimaced.

"Yeah, sorry about that," Dante said, guessing the source of Nero's expression.

The wound looked even worse than Nero had expected it to. Black discharge drained from it, muddying the blood that had been issuing from the injury. He pressed his lips together in a thin line to keep himself from wrinkling his nose at the sight.

He reached for the forceps, but stopped when he saw that they still had his blood all over them. First aid training in the Order had been very specific about not sharing bloody tools. _That_ much he remembered being very important.

"Don't worry about that," Dante assured him, noticing his hesitation with the forceps, "I'm pretty sure I'll be fine if I get a little bit of your blood on me. It really couldn't be worse than _this."_

Nero snorted, and picked up the forceps, "Alright. If you say so…"

"I mean," the man in red interrupted, "You don't have herpes or anything, right?"

Nero gave him a flat look, "No. And I'm pretty sure herpes isn't transmitted through the blood."

Dante just grinned at him. Nero sighed and gave the puncture a closer look. Gingerly, he used the fingers of his Devil Bringer to push it open a little more, and did his best to ignore Dante's sharply pained intake of breath. Without further hesitation, Nero plunged the end of the forceps into the wound, holding Dante still with his demonic arm when the other man squirmed in pain. He wished he could see inside the injury, to get a better idea what he was looking for, but he had to make do.

After a moment of fishing around, he pulled the forceps out once a moan of pain finally escaped from Dante's throat. He didn't like causing the other half-devil pain, but…he knew there was something else in the wound. He couldn't put his finger on how exactly he knew; he could just _sense _it. Nero almost rolled his eyes at his own train of through because it just sounded _so_ corny.

"You okay?" he asked, looking up at Dante to make sure the other man wasn't about to pass out or anything equally unpleasant.

Dante grinned weakly and gave him a thumbs-up.

"Okay, I'm gonna try again," Nero waited for Dante to brace himself before he plunged the forceps back into the other man's chest. This time he didn't fish around with them as much, and instead tried to follow the channel of the wound until—

"Ow, shit!" he yelped, as a sudden shock went up his arm. It took all his self-control not to rip the forceps back out of Dante's chest right then and there. In fact, Dante had obviously been affected by the jolt as well, as he had jerked sharply and let out a grunt of pain at the same time Nero had.

"Well if that's not what we're looking for I don't know what is," Nero said, trying to be upbeat as sweat trickled tensely down his forehead. Knowing Dante was probably not going to be able to take much more probing, Nero seized the object as quickly as he could without injuring Dante further and with no line of sight to it, and after a near-scare where it almost slipped free it was out!

He dropped the bloody object onto the coffee table and grabbed some gauze swabs to press over the wound in Dante's chest which had started streaming blood at an almost alarming rate.

Dante looked almost grey, but he grinned at Nero despite it, "You should be a doctor."

"Don't talk stupid," Nero muttered gruffly, feeling his ears turn pink. He pressed the gauze a little harder over the wound.

"I don't think you need to keep doing that," the man in red said after a moment, "I feel pretty good."

"Yeah, but you look like shi—" Nero cut himself off when he looked up at Dante's face again, which had only a moment ago been ashen and pale. Now his cheeks were flushed and he practically glowed with vitality. It was something quite in common with the Dante that Nero had met back in Fortuna.

"I look like _what_?" Dante demanded indignantly, and smirked playfully, "I look damn good, Nero, it's okay if you admit it."

Nero leaned back, taking the gauze pads off of the other hunter's chest. There was still a smear of blood and black puss, but the wound had healed over and was now little more than a patch of newly formed pink skin and a red scar. Even as Nero watched that it faded until there was only a faint white ridge as evidence that there had ever been a wound.

"Wow."

"What, you said you'd seen me stabbed in the chest before," Dante countered, "This surprises you? I'm pretty much invincible, you know."

"Don't get cocky," Nero quipped, "You weren't invincible with this thing in your chest…whatever it is."

He leaned over the object as it sat on the table, looking deceptively benign. Nero had honestly been expecting a fragment of bone—Dante had said the angel had broken off a piece of its wing in him, after all. But, it wasn't a bone. It glimmered pale blue, barely visible beneath the blood that coated it. Without thinking, he picked it up in his right hand. Almost as soon as his Devil Bringer touched it, the object changed. It unfolded not unlike a flower, and suddenly it was a feather, flawless and spotless and white.

"Well, would you look at that," Dante said in surprised interest, leaning forward to look at the feather in Nero's palm. "It's reverted back to its original state. Being away from the angel, this piece healed itself."

"So what happens now? Does that mean the angel will want it back?" Nero asked, looking up at Dante.

"I bet so," Dante confirmed, "If he knows he lost it. He might not have missed it yet."

As they watched it, the feather let out a glowing blue pulse, and spun in a little circle until orienting itself in a certain direction almost like a compass.

"Huh," Nero said, raising his eyebrows, "Well that's new."

"It doesn't have enough power to fly to the angel on its own," Dante guessed, "So it's pointing in the direction…!"

His and Nero's eyes met, and they both leapt up at the same time.

* * *

**To Be Continued**


	7. Tear

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

Ok sooo I lied about being on regular schedule. SORRY. I'm sorry. I legitimately had a writer's block that I could only break by going back and playing some DMC. I know this chapter is sort of short too, I'm sorryyyy. I'll try to do better...

* * *

**Mission 07: Tear**

* * *

"So what's the plan here?" Nero shouted into Dante's ear as they sped down the street once more on his motorcycle.

Oh, how Nero was growing to hate this vehicle.

"Find them. Kick ass," Dante answered, succinct for once.

He hadn't called Lady back. Nero assumed this was because Dante felt one hundred percent. He couldn't help but be a little underwhelmed by this plan of attack, though. Just because Dante was back in top form did not mean they would be able to conclude this whole thing right here and now.

Nero turned his attention to the feather clutched in his fist. His grip on it was tight enough to keep it from blowing away, but they were forced to stop every few minutes to make sure they were heading in the right direction. It was something Dante's patience could barely handle, but there was no other alternative. They couldn't risk losing their only compass.

As they pulled over a fourth time, the feather pointed them in a new direction, and Nero groaned, "Dante this is impossible. The stupid thing is _moving_. There's no way we're catching up to it this way. We need a better tracking method."

Even putting the feather in some kind of clear box would be better than nothing, Nero thought, but he didn't voice the idea. Dante's attention wasn't on him, but he was looking…?

"Why are you staring at my crotch?" Nero demanded.

Dante looked up and grinned, "I wasn't, but don't let that kill your self-esteem. I'm sure whatever you're packin' under is the hood plenty stare-worthy."

The young Knight did his best to ignore the flush that crept up his neck at that.

"Your pocket's glowing," Dante finally explained.

Surprised, Nero looked down and saw that the other man wasn't lying. His pocket was emitting a faint bluish light, visible through the fabric. Cautiously, he transferred the feather to his human hand, and reached into his pocket with the Devil Bringer, drawing forth a fist-sized orb that pulsated with light.

It was the power source he had pulled out of the angel's cell. He had forgotten about it until now. Had it only just reactivated? He explained to Dante what it was, and both men frowned over the object for a moment.

Finally, Dante said, "It must be a demonic power source. It's the only good explanation."

Nero nodded, and questioned, "But, what is it reacting to? It didn't glow nearly this brightly when I pulled it out of the cell."

"Well you're in a different time and place," Dante observed, "It also might be reacting to that feather. That'd be _my _guess, anyway."

"You think?" Nero held up the angel's feather between two fingers and lifted the orb up in the other hand, holding both objects at eye level.

Without warning the orb let out a violent flash of light that sent Nero's head snapping back, optical nerves screaming, and the feather flew out of his grasp. He saw nothing of what followed through the heavy black and white spots obscuring his vision, but he could feel the energy in the objects changing. When he could finally focus on them again through blurry eyes, they had transmuted into a single object.

"The hell…?" he heard Dante mutter.

Cautiously, Nero examined the object. It looked something like a piece of amber with an insect frozen inside, if amber had been blue. The feather was contained within the orb, which had changed shape so that it curled upward from the spherical part in Nero's fist like the tail of a comet. The way the feather was encased in the crystalline object was reminiscent of the Wing Talisman he had found in the well…it seemed like forever ago now.

"Shit…I know what that is," Dante said so sharply that Nero nearly dropped the object. "You said it was being used as a power source? It all makes sense now…"

"Care to enlighten me?" Nero asked flatly.

"It's a Tear of the Fallen," the man in red elaborated, "You find them here and there sometimes, but they're pretty rare. Angels shed them when they Fall. The one we're going after isn't Fallen so it makes me wonder how your mad scientist guy found it."

"I try not to think about Agnus," Nero replied, returning his attention to the Tear, "Why did it absorb the feather? That sort of defeats the purpose of us using it to find the angel…"

"My guess? 'Cause they're both originally angelic," Dante mused, taking the object from Nero and examining it himself. Once it touched his hand the glow dimmed and the object went dark. "Well, that's new," he observed and handed it back to Nero.

As soon as Nero's fingers made contact it shimmered to life again.

"I think it likes you," Dante grinned at him.

Nero wondered suddenly if he could absorb it into his arm. It wasn't dissimilar in size to the past things he had used to get more powerful, it was worth a try…

There was a bright flash of light and the familiar sensation of new energy seeping into his Devil Bringer.

Nero grinned at Dante, feeling some self-satisfaction at the look of surprise on the other demon hunter's face. He flexed the talons of his right hand experimentally, and it wasn't long before the demonic arm had told him how to use this new upgrade. It always told him what to do with them, in its own little way, ever since he'd learned to Snatch.

"Let's find that angel," Nero smirked, holding up his Devil Bringer as it began to glow more brightly, and then it shot a beacon of light east. "Just follow the yellow brick road," he added.

Dante grinned, and turned to face front, gunning the bike's engine and then slamming forward the throttle. They rocketed off, skidding around a turn and then flying toward whatever waited for them at the end of the Devil Bringer's jet of light.

* * *

They were interrupted before they could reach their quarry. Nero thought it was unsurprising; things had seemed fairly quiet despite Dante's delay on the way to the cathedral earlier. The sun was beginning to set, its dying rays bleeding red across the sky, when the demon came out of nowhere, and slammed into the side of the motorcycle, sending both men flying.

Dante, being Dante, shot the demon in mid-air.

Nero's back slammed into the asphalt and an instant later Dante collided with him, landing sprawled on top of the Knight. For a second they grappled with each other, each trying to get to their feet and impeding the other at the same time before Dante managed to pin Nero's human arm between them.

"Why are we fighting?" Dante half-laughed, panting from the effort.

"We're not fighting you idiot," Nero snapped, and took the opportunity of stillness to pluck the other man off by the back of his coat with his Devil Bringer, and toss him to the side, "You almost crushed me."

"I'd bet you're tougher than you look," Dante replied cheekily, brushing some of his white hair aside and readjusting his askew jacket.

In front of them, the demon that had attacked them lay dying on the road, and let out a feeble whimper. They both shot it at the same time.

"Stop copying me," Nero said flatly to Dante, but after a second he broke into a grin.

"I think you're the one copying me, man," Sparda's son countered, blowing smoke from the barrel of Ivory before returning the gun to its holster with a flourish.

"Bullshit."

"No, I really do," Dante continued, "I mean I can't blame you. I _am _pretty badass. And you could wash laundry on my abs. _As I'm sure you've noticed."_

Nero _had_ noticed, many times. It was sort of difficult _not_ to notice, what with Dante's penchant for not wearing an actual shirt. But, Nero had kept that to himself.

"I've seen better," Nero lied.

"Oh I don't believe that," Dante laughed.

Rolling his eyes, Nero got to his feet with a grunt and dusted himself off. He didn't doubt Dante was flirting with him, but Dante was the type of guy who flirted with everyone. Nero had seen it first hand with older Dante during the man's brief invasion into Fortuna. This younger Dante was so much more over the top than the Dante Nero had known…he wasn't really surprised.

"We've got an angel to deal with, don't we?" he demanded.

"Oh come on," Dante sighed, also standing up, "Have a little fun, Nero. What, did I hurt your feelings?"

Nero frowned at him, "No. How would you have hurt my feelings?"

"So you don't like guys flirting with you," Dante concluded, "Is that it? Sorry, I assumed…"

Nero felt his face start to get warm, and he deepened his scowl in an attempt to distract from it. He really didn't want to continue the awkward train this conversation was about to crash into, but some morbid self-loathing part of him overpowered his good sense long enough to demand, "Assumed what?"

"Well…" Dante scratched the back of his head, suddenly uncharacteristically sheepish, "Well, I mean, no straight man wears jeans that tight."

Nero unconsciously looked down at his pants for a brief second before looking back up at Dante, "I'm not g—"

But he stopped before the word had completely escaped, and rethought it. It wasn't something Nero had ever really considered, being gay or being straight. He just did what he wanted. He'd lost interest in Kyrie when she had ceased to be interesting…right? Some part of himself mocked the fact that he and Dante were having this discussion on the side of the road after crashing a motorcycle. Automobile accidents weren't something commonly associated with sudden sexual awareness, at least as far as Nero knew.

"Hey it's ok if you are," Dante cut in.

"Why are we talking about this?" Nero groaned, covering his eyes with one hand in embarrassment.

"Sorry, sorry," Dante held up his hands in surrender, "I'll drop it. Jeez. Didn't realize it was such a testy subject. What were you raised to hate gays or something?"

"The Order frowned on it," was the grumbled reply, "It never really came up, though. I never really…"

He trailed off, horrified at what he had just nearly admitted. Nero would be damned and damned again if he was going to stand on the side of the road and confess to _Dante_ of all people that he was a virgin. Nope. No way.

Quickly, he turned his back on the other man and righted the motorcycle, "Let's just go and find this angel."

But Dante had Ivory out, pointed at Nero. Before the Knight could even question Dante's intentions, the man in red fired off several shots which blasted past Nero's head. Red Queen was in his hand before he had fully registered the demons behind him. He spun on his toe and grinned, charging forward and cutting down the nearest demon, hardly pausing as he Snatched another and pounded it into the ground until there was nothing left of it but blood and crushed limbs.

When all the demons were dead, Nero turned back toward Dante and observed, "These are different from those…what did you call them? Hell Prides?"

The other devil hunter sauntered up beside him and looked down at their handiwork, "Well, kinda hard to tell with the one you got your hands on, but yeah I'd say they're definitely different. For one thing Hells Prides don't bleed. These things are different…"

He nudged the body of one with the toe of his boot, and it dissolved into a foul-smelling pile of bloody sludge. The one dead demon that hadn't fully dissolved yet lay on the sidewalk, blood staining the concrete. It was almost bat-like, but its head was more similar to a wolf's. Curved blades were attached to its wingtips like macabre scythes. As they watched it, the last demon also melted into the pavement.

"Disgusting," Nero growled, covering his nose with one hand and stepping back as the smell washed over them—sulfur and blood and entrails.

"They're demons, what do you expect?" Dante snorted, "Pretty bold of them to attack us like that, though. I haven't had something like that happen for a while…especially since they were such wimps."

"Well…" Nero said, flexing his demonic hand and then holding it up, "Should we get back on task?"

He focused his energy in the Devil Bringer and reached out for the power the Tear had granted…and it slipped away. He tried again, only to have the same thing happen. Frowning, he looked down at his glowing palm as though it might have an explanation for this sudden setback.

"Performance issues?" Dante questioned, and Nero wanted to punch him.

"I don't know. This has never happened before."

"Don't worry about it. It happens to the best of us," Dante quipped, patting Nero on the shoulder and walking back to the motorcycle.

Nero had the vague feeling that there had been a double entendre somewhere in Dante's words, but he didn't say anything. He was too concerned with why suddenly the ability he had just gained wouldn't work. As he climbed on the motorcycle behind Dante, he found himself wishing the thing had come with an instruction manual.

"What now?" he asked, gripping the sides of the seat this time; the awkwardness of their conversation too recent for him to want to wrap his arms around Dante's waist again.

"Well, now I guess we head back to the shop. Wash off the blood. Wait for your arm to get over its stage fright," was the reply as the engine roared to life.

"You make it sound so simple…" Nero muttered as they sped off.

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

I feel as if I should clarify something from a previous chapter. No one's complained about it but in hindsight it seemed a little coarse. The quip about Lady from the anime was me voicing my rage about said anime. I just wanted to say that this story isn't counting the DMC anime as canon, but if you see anything mentioned from it, it's probably me making jabs about it. XD I'm sorry if this bothers anyone I just can't help it.

ALSO, new illustration. This one's of the Tear of the Fallen.

Unfortunately with FFnet's lame new update I can no longer even link with spaces. Sooo you'll have to find it through my deviantart, which I also cannot link to apparently, but the name of which is **SchmutzigeBanane**. This really sucks and I'm sorry but I do plan on continuing with illustrations for the story so if you want to see them that's the way it has to be. I made a DMC folder in my gallery so they'll be easier to find.


	8. The Shadow Mother

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

AHHHHH omg I'm so sorry it took so long to get this update. I would make an excuse about it being con season (which just ended) but really I just couldn't get the motivation to get through it until now. I hope everyone can forgive me, and that this chapter will have been worth the wait.

* * *

**Mission 08: The Shadow Mother**

* * *

In the Opera House, Vergil frowned at Nero.

"What's that look for?" Nero demanded, crossing his arms defiantly.

"You like him."

Nero balked, "What?"

"Don't play dumb," the man in blue said dryly, "You want to…_fuck_ my brother."

"Augghh don't just _say_ stuff like that," Nero grimaced, "I'm not gay. Why the hell are you both latched onto that? Is it a twin thing?"

"No," Vergil answered flatly, "It's a _meeting you in person_ thing."

Nero pinched the bridge of his nose between two fingers and said, "You're not going to make me mad. You're not going to piss me off. I am dreaming; this is supposed to be restful."

"You've developed a mantra?" Vergil snorted derisively, "Really?"

"I don't know how many people have told you," Nero replied, "But you're just as infuriating as Dante, except not as easily likeable. Maybe someone _should_ have told you, you're _kind of a dick."_

"I've killed men for less than that," Vergil threatened.

"Oh, yeah, what are you gonna do?" Nero spread his arms, "Go ahead. Drown me in your impotent rage. I'm waiting."

"Had I less self-control, I might," the man replied darkly.

"Yeah, I'll believe it when I see it," Nero muttered.

After a brief and grim silence between them, Vergil grumbled, "Why must we always argue like this?"

"I dunno, maybe because you're _kind _of a _dick,_" Nero reiterated, not feeling particularly charitable toward the other half-devil at the moment.

"I'm cryptic. There is a difference," he defended.

The young Knight snorted, "Oh, really. Okay, well answer me this: how the hell does it help you to be "cryptic" with the only other person you have interaction with, when being forthcoming would help us _both_ a lot more."

Vergil shrugged one shoulder and grunted, "I suppose it's my nature."

Nero rolled his eyes and sat down on the stage, "Fine then. I'll just sit here in silence until I wake up."

* * *

Nero rolled out of the creaky bed-on-wheels feeling at least moderately rested. That was a blessing, considering the lingering feeling of annoyance he still had toward Dante's disagreeable twin.

Sunlight filtered weakly through the blinds, illuminating his little storage cupboard-cum-bedroom. He had once again slept in the make-shift pajamas that Dante had lent him, and he didn't bother changing just yet. He stomped into his boots and shuffled out of the room, yawning as he descended the stairs.

At first he didn't see Dante, as a cursory look around the shop didn't show him anything out of place. But something moved in the corner and he turned to spot Dante curled up on the couch with his back to the room, red coat draped over himself as a make-shift blanket.

Nero stood still for a moment, pondering what he should do. It was still fairly early in the morning and letting Dante sleep might be a good idea. After all, he was fairly sure the other man hadn't been sleeping very well for who knew how long…

The Knight crept across the office, trying to make as little noise as possible as he made for the back room. With any luck he could be in and out of the shower before Dante woke up and used his uncanny ability to initiate awkwardness.

But, as he passed the couch, Dante made a noise in his sleep, and Nero froze. Slowly he looked down at the sleeping devil hunter and exhaled slowly in relief when he saw the other man's eyes were still closed. In sleep, Dante looked…well different. When he was awake he had, despite his carefree attitude, the air of someone with the weight of the world on his shoulders. Nero thought it probably had to do with losing his brother, but it…wasn't really his business.

He felt a little creepy standing over Dante and watching the other man sleep, so he quickly absconded toward the back room and into the bathroom beyond. This time he waited for the water temperature to rise to a comfortable level before shedding his clothing onto the tiled floor and ducking under the stream of water.

As he let the water soak into his hair, he thought about what Vergil had said in the little dream world. Nero's ears turned pink despite himself and he scowled at the tiled wall as though it were the one who had mocked him. His feelings on Dante were…_complicated. _ He was not _gay. _ Sure, Dante was infuriatingly charming—when he wanted to be—and not bad looking but Nero didn't _like him like that. _

Right?

He huffed in frustration and picked up the ladies' brand shampoo. He didn't need to be worrying about this right now—not when there were more important matters at hand, like keeping the angel from murdering more innocent people, and figuring out how to get the angel blade back from its clutches. Or, Cassius' clutches…he wasn't sure exactly. But he did know that he needed to get the Tear working again.

Mentally he cursed himself. He should have asked Vergil about it instead of letting the other man get under his skin.

The sound of the door opening a few minutes later made him jump, and he peeked around the faintly misted curtain to see Dante.

"Sorry, gotta piss," the other man shrugged, "Hope you don't mind."

Nero retreated back to the other side of the curtain and mumbled, "No…why would I mind…"

He felt his ears burning slightly, and plunged his head under the stream of water in order to avoid hearing the sounds of Dante taking a leak five feet away.

When he felt like a safe amount of time had passed he resurfaced, brushing the wet tendrils of white out of his face and letting out a surprised cry as he realized Dante was standing right next to him on the other side of the curtain. He didn't quite know how, but before he knew it he was on his ass, back smacked against the side of the tub.

"Ow…" he grumbled, pulling his legs up in front of himself just as Dante yanked the curtain open.

"You ok?"

"Augh, Dante get out!" Nero snarled, throwing a bar of soap at the other man, who dodged it and laughed.

"You didn't answer me, sorry!" He then closed the curtain again—not that there was any point now, as far as Nero's dignity was concerned—and beat a hasty retreat. Before he closed the bathroom door behind himself he said, "I was just offering to let you use my toothbrush, by the way."

Nero put his face in his hands as he heard the door close, and groaned. Why? Why did these things happen to _him?_ Some small part of him thought that Dante did it on purpose.

Well, maybe not _that_ small, now that he really thought about it. Dante was sort of an ass…he probably thought making Nero uncomfortable in intimate and sexually harassing ways was the funniest thing ever.

Sighing, Nero picked himself up from the bottom of the tub and turned the water off. A toothbrush _did_ sound good, considering he had been making do with soap and a finger for the past couple days.

Now that he was on the subject of commodities he missed, underwear was back to the top of his list. There was only so long he could make do with one pair of boxers and that time had already passed. He didn't know how Dante did it. Jeans chafed badly enough, Nero could only imagine how those leather pants were.

"Stop it," Nero grumbled to himself as he grabbed his towel. He refused to think about the state of Dante's junk.

After he had toweled his hair and body dry, he wrapped the towel around his waist and cracked the door open to let some of the steam out. Going over to the sink, Nero wiped the condensation off the mirror, and picked up Dante's toothbrush. He stood there a moment, debating the pros and cons of this action, and wondering if he should be concerned about where Dante's mouth had been, before finally giving in and grabbing the tube of toothpaste.

When he finally stepped back out to the main room Dante grinned at him.

"What," Nero demanded flatly.

"Oh, nothing," the other man shrugged, but the grin didn't leave his face.

Nero rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, "So you saw me naked. Big whoop. You're a grown-up, stop being immature."

"But it's so much fun," Dante pouted, spinning in his desk chair and then adding, "Besides I didn't get a good look. Your secrets are mostly safe."

"What a relief," Nero grumbled sarcastically, "I'm going to get dressed, I'm sure you're not planning on barging in on that too?"

"No promises," the man in red teased.

Nero locked the door when he changed.

* * *

Nero sat on the couch, trying to grasp the Tear within his Devil Bringer. Dante was sitting at his desk with his feet up, nursing a can of beer and being generally unhelpful. Nero just hoped that the phone didn't ring; if someone else got killed while they were wasting time here…

The phone rang, and Nero cursed under his breath. Dante quirked an eyebrow at him before picking up the receiver, "Devil May Cry."

Nero watched him listen to the person on the other line, trying to discern what the news was by watching Dante's facial expression, but he had no luck.

When Dante finally hung the phone up he turned to Nero, "Those bat wolf things from yesterday are terrorizing a neighborhood nearby. It's probably easy work but if you want to tag along you're welcome to."

Nero was almost tempted to turn the other man down and stay at the shop, but he decided blowing off some steam might be the right thing to do at this point….even if it _did _mean having to travel on the back of that infernal motorcycle, pressed up against Dante's back…

"I'll go," he said sharply, earning a slightly surprised look from the other devil hunter.

Once they both had their shit together, Dante drove them through town. Nero was curious what a neighborhood being terrorized by wolf-bat demons would look like, but he didn't have to speculate long. They just managed to avoid being knocked off the bike this time thanks to Dante swerving at the right moment, and Nero was leaping off the back of the motorcycle before it had even skidded to a complete stop, Blue Rose in his hand pumping lead into the first demon that had dared assault them.

It fell to the asphalt with a clatter of wing-scythes and melted into goo, and behind it three more lunged forward, only to meet the same bullet-induced fate. Nero paused to reload his revolver as Dante joined him to take stock of the situation.

It wasn't a nice neighborhood, but it wasn't a slum either. It was one of those in-between neighborhoods where people lived in-between lives. Well, it would have been if there weren't demons clinging to the rooftops like gargoyles, and flying through the streets looking for prey.

There were bodies in the street; people who had been unlucky enough to be outside when this plague had first struck. Nearest them a man lay face down in the gutter, his blood pooled around him. His legs were twenty feet away.

"Ugh," Nero grimaced, revving Red Queen to Exceed.

"Neat trick," Dante observed as the blade blazed red, "Very stylish."

"You bet your ass it is," smirked Nero before whipping the sword off his back and charging into the fray.

Not to be outdone, Dante drew Rebellion with a flourish and went up the opposite side of the street. Nero Snatched one out of the air and then slashed it in two before whipping around and beheading one about to attack his rear. Beyond him, Dante darted a few feet up the side of a building and back-flipped toward his prey, slicing through three demons in mid-air with a crow of mirth.

Together they carved a bloody swathe through the flock until there was nothing left but melting gobs of blood and fur and bone across the neighborhood.

As he slung Rebellion to get the excess blood off, Dante sighed, "Whew. Well, all in a day's work, eh?"

But before Nero could reply, a rumbling started beneath their feet.

"Earthquake…?" the young Knight began, but suddenly one of the wrecked houses near them exploded.

The thing flew toward them, giant and black and oozing, the whole thing vaguely humanoid but unnaturally thin and tall. The tail might have been barbed with bone or metal but it was coated in a film of shadows, as was the rest of its body, but the film moved in places like an aura or cloak, and every now and then Nero thought he could see screaming faces shadowed within. Black wings unfolded from its back, bat-like and littered with ragged holes, and the ends of its long fingers ended in bloody hooks. It was similar to the wolf-bat demons, but at the same time vastly different.

And, it had no face. Where the face should have been was a black blank expanse of skin stretched over the skull, but there weren't even indention of sockets. It was utterly devoid of features.

"So I take it you're the boss here," Dante quipped.

It land a few yards from them, smashing small craters in the pavement with its hands and feet, crouching in a squatting position, and both men knew its attention was suddenly entirely focused on them, even through the blankness of its non-face. The air pressure changed, just enough to be noticeable.

"What's the matter?" the man in red continued, "Big demons are normally so _chatty_. Cat got your tongue?"

Nero wasn't entirely sure it honestly heard Dante. It didn't have ears that he could see. It sensed them, was all he knew. He revved Red Queen into Exceed again and watched the black blank creature slink toward them now. It dragged its hands along the ground, the claws scraping gouges across the asphalt.

And suddenly sharp pain exploded in Nero's left leg. He leaped backwards out of reflex, and fell to one knee as his leg gave way. Blood spattered across the pavement beneath him and he saw a shadow sink away into the ground where he had been standing a moment ago.

"Sh-Shit!" he growled, clamping a hand over the slash across his inner-thigh as blood seeped through his fingers.

"Nero!" Dante shouted, stepping toward him and then suddenly diving away to avoid a barbed tentacle of darkness that erupted from his shadow.

"A-Artery!" Nero managed to bark at him as he squeezed a little harder, trying to stem the flow of blood before it started making him light-headed.

Dante dodge another attack from his shadow and then made it to Nero, grabbing the young man by the back of the coat and yanking him to the side and out of the way of the tentacle that stabbed upward and would have caught him in the gut. Red sprayed over the ground as he fell against Dante before pressing his hand against the wound again.

"Careful, it'll get…on your shoes," he grunted to the man in red weakly.

"A little late for that," Dante snorted, "Can you move?"

"Not right now," Nero grunted, as more sanguine liquid oozed from beneath his hand, "It's not closing…something in that shadow…I don't know. It should be closing…"

"The demon's aura…or something about it," Dante muttered, pulling him back further and out of the way of another strike, "I'll distract it, try not to get killed, okay?"

"Deal," Nero grumbled.

The son of Sparda jumped to his feet and without any further hesitation charged the demon, firing Ebony and Ivory in tandem at the demon. The bullets struck it and sent it reeling backward briefly but it stopped, flaring its wings out wide and then flapping them with a sound like a thunder-clap.

But Dante had definitely grabbed its full attention. Angry tentacles erupted from Dante's shadow, and all the shadows being cast near him. He deflected them with a spin of Rebellion and then somersaulted out of the way of a second round, firing at the demon again mid-jump.

One of the tentacles caught him in the side as he landed, and for a second Nero's stomach froze, but it was only a graze and Dante was on his feet again, strafing right and firing again.

But the bullets weren't doing enough damage. They made contact, but apart from suppressing the thing's movements—which wasn't helping because it could project attacks through the shadows near its opponent—all the bullets were doing were annoying it.

But there was something…Nero was sure he was missing something. The sun was at the part in the day where everything had long, dark shadows, there wasn't anywhere safe for Dante, the barbed tentacles could come from anywhere…

"DANTE!" Nero shouted suddenly, "Get near it! If I'm right, it can't attack you with its own shadow!"

"Easier said than done, Nero!" the other man shouted back, but he still did as Nero instructed. He dodged another attack from beneath, and slid in under the demon's extended wings. Sensing what the devil hunter was doing, the dark figure curled its wings under in an attempt to make it's shadow smaller, and Dante took the opportunity to hack at it with his sword, sending black blood spraying everywhere with each strike.

He jumped out of the way when it swiped after him with a taloned hand, and had to quickly dodge a razor-edged tentacle when he briefly slipped from under its shadow. He slashed at it again, but before he could do much more damage it suddenly unfurled its wings again. Dante had to roll quickly to the side to avoid being gouged as it leapt into the air.

The higher it went the small its shadow got, but Dante still managed to stay under it. Nero realized that it couldn't tell where the man in red was when he was in its shadow.

It too seemed to realize this because a moment later a slurry of slimy shadows erupted around him and twisted around his arms and legs, pulling him flat against the concrete. He cursed and struggled but more followed the first group, wrapping around his chest and neck, a clear threat to cut off his air.

Without his hand to stem the blood flow to his wounded leg, he felt the warm liquid flowing out, spreading across the fabric of his jeans and across the blacktop.

"Nero!" Dante shouted, but he stayed in the thing's shadow. Nero was glad he was at least that smart, but he hoped Dante could hurry up and kill the demon because he thought it might plan to simply let him bleed out. Slimy bastard.

Dante fired his gun at the thing, running to keep in its shadow as it circled above them. A few times he slipped out, and had to dodge impalement, but he managed to keep inside it fairly well. Eventually it seemed to sense that it would need to land in order to finish the fight, and it crashed into the ground in front of Dante, sending out a shockwave that he barely managed to jump and avoid.

The tentacles keeping Nero captive tightened, and he gasped, seeing white spots in his vision. More came up and wrapped themselves around his thighs and pelvis, so tight that he almost felt like they might be trying to crush him against the pavement. But the tightness also inadvertently began to act as a tourniquet, and the blood seeping out of his leg slowed.

Meanwhile, Dante faced off against the demon, Rebellion once again in hand. It stood all the way up from its crouch this time, and something in its chest burst open. Black ooze spattered across the ground and across Dante, who made a disgusted sort of noise. Then, tentacles exploded from the wide space, not unlike a cross-ways mouth, in its chest.

"Augh, don't you have enough of those?" Dante complained, "No one's going to be impressed by the fact that you have a giant tentacled vagina on your chest."

It didn't seems to notice his insults however, and several tentacles quickly shot from its chest in an attempt to ensnare the devil hunter, but he sliced through them with the sword and quick as lightning fired a few more rapid shots with Ivory.

"I mean what is this?" Dante continued as he dodged another attack, "A tentacle hentai?"

He smirked back at Nero and observed, "Bet _you're_ glad it's not."

"Oh yeah," Nero grunted, "Just peachy. Pay attention to what you're doing."

"You know what I'm thinking though?" Dante carried on, speaking to the demon again, "Opening up your chest like that? You seem the type to have one of those dumb and really obvious weak points."

To illustrate this statement, Dante rushed forward and before Nero even realized what the man was doing, or the demon realized it for that matter, Rebellion was slicing into its chest cavity with the squelching sound of bloody victory.

"Huh, guess so," Dante concluded as its body thudded to the ground, "Kinda disappointing."

The shadows holding Nero down suddenly evaporated, and sat up in time to see the demon's corpse melt into the ground like the others had.

"A little…help please," he hissed.

"Oh yeah," Dante looked surprised and hurried to his side, "Still bleeding?"

"Not as bad," Nero admitted with relief, "But still a little bit, yeah."

Dante helped him get to his feet, and together they limped to where Red Queen was lying. Nero sheathed the sword and then looked around, taking stock of the area.

"Looks like a warzone," he observed.

"I wish we knew where those things came from," Dante said, "I guess the slimy shadow monster was their mommy but you can never know for sure if they don't talk to you. Kind of a relief though, usually demons like that are so…"

"Long-winded, yeah," Nero supplied with a grin.

With a little effort, mainly because Nero refused to let Dante carry him, they made it back to the motorcycle, and stopped short when they saw the figure in white waiting for them.

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

I don't have an illustration of the shadow mommy because I have a hard time drawing ugly scary things, but if anybody wants to take a whack at it I'd love to see it! XD


	9. Fever

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

Hey look another update! School starts back up next week so maybe I'm getting my work ethic back. XD Let's see if this streak lasts another week, eh?

* * *

**Mission 09: Fever**

* * *

"Cassius!" Nero snarled, free hand immediately going for his revolver.

Dante had the same idea and Ivory too was in his hand, both guns trained on the Knight.

He held up his hands in a sign of peace, making no move to draw his gunblade. He looked tired, and a little ill, but there was no look of unhinged hysteria in his eyes like the last time Nero had crossed paths with him. The scrape on his jaw where he had skinned it on the sidewalk during their fight had scabbed over, but there were fresher injuries on him now. His uniform was dirty and bloody in places, torn in others, and he had a black eye and a cut on his cheek that looked infected.

"I came to give you a message," he said, voice sounding hoarse, "Remiel didn't kill any humans. Now that we have his sword there's nothing you can do to him, but I came to tell you this. And…"

He reached into his pocket, but paused when both Nero and Dante put their fingers on their triggers. More slowly, he reached into his pocket and gingerly produced a feather, white and clean and practically glowing in the sunlight. It shivered in his grip, behaving not unlike the one Nero had recovered, and he held it out to them.

"This is not a peace offering," he clarified, "You're both demons. But I'm thinking a little more clearly, and…this can help me prove that Remiel hasn't harmed innocents."

"What about you," Dante queried as Nero took the feather, "You look kind of 'harmed' to me."

Cassius shrugged one shoulder, the lopsided motion making apparent the fact that his other one was injured in some way, and scoffed, "Don't worry about it. A few bruises are worth it to have an angel behind me. Once he's better I won't get knocked around so much. The song…the song's the worst. But it's nothing…"

Nero thought it sounded an awful lot like an abusive relationship, but what did he care? Last time they'd met, Cassius had shot him in the chest. Let the little shit get beaten up by his nutty angel boyfriend, they deserved each other.

But, he did remember that song. The aura the angel put off sometimes. It had been uncomfortable for Nero, he remembered that it had brought Cassius to his knees. Something like that couldn't be good for a regular human like the younger Knight…

He also remembered when the angel had first been released. He had nearly killed Cassius by slamming him into a wall, and Nero had no idea if Daniele was still alive or not. It seemed like ages ago, that skirmish in the darkness under Fortuna Castle, but the memories came back strong and bitter, and for a split second Nero was almost afraid for Cassius.

"I should return the favor you did me at the cathedral, you bastard," Nero bit out finally, to distract himself from feeling sorry for the youth.

"I don't recall doing you any favors," Cassius retorted, and he turned to leave, pausing to add, "I don't know how, but everything going on right now is…connected. There's something worse in this city than the things you killed here, something's controlling them. We've…been attacked, I don't know why…"

He pressed a hand against the side of his head as though trying to stave off a headache and muttered, "Sorry."

They watched him limp away. Nero wanted to stop him and punch him in his black eye, but his leg had other ideas, and Dante had to help him hobble to the motorcycle.

"That ass," Nero grumbled, smacking the feather into Dante's surprised palm, "First he tries to kill me, _then_ he shows up trying to play the wrongfully accused card…Do something with that."

Dante examined the feather, "Looks like the one in the Tear. I wonder if he took it without asking…"

"I wonder what he expects us to _do_ with it," Nero barked, "He can't know we already have one…"

"Hm," Dante suddenly looked thoughtful, and plunged a hand into his pocket, pulling out the handful of bloody feathers he had picked up from the murder scene at the Magnolia East Lounge. They were bloody and dirty still, and he frowned at them, "Hmmm…."

"Hmmm?" Nero inquired.

"We should get back to the shop," Dante answered, and Nero huffed as the other man pocketed all of the feathers and mounted the bike in front of him, "I'll be able to think more clearly when we've gotten your leg taken care of."

"Yeah that might be good," Nero mumbled, grabbing onto Dante's waist. It was true the bleeding had slowed down from the stream it had been at first, which meant some part of his demonic healing had kicked in, but he was starting to feel light-headed, which was never a good sign.

After making sure Nero wouldn't fall off the back of the bike, Dante took off, and they were soon back at the shop.

Together they hobbled inside, and Dante helped Nero sit down on the couch. The blood from the wound had spread across most of the upper left side of Nero's jeans by this point, and the parts of the fabric that were drying were becoming stiff, making movement a little more difficult.

Dante retrieved the dubious first-aid kit once again, and put it on the coffee table. He knelt in front of Nero and observed, "You're gonna need some new pants."

"No shit," Nero grunted.

"Yeah, especially since I need to cut it away from you leg so I can see what's going on down there," Dante added.

That sounded so wrong. Nero scowled at him, but didn't say anything as Dante pulled a small pair of scissors out of the kit. At this point the jeans were ruined anyway so there was really no reason to protest cutting them up. Still though, he couldn't help feeling…uncomfortable, especially when Dante made a motion to start unfastening Nero's belt.

"Whoa, whoa," Nero put his hand down, "I can do that myself."

The man in red shrugged, "Alright. Suit yourself."

Feeling a blush creep up his neck, the young Knight did just that, unbuckling his belt and holster, and pulling them off so that they were out of the way. Once that was done, Dante put a hand on Nero's knee and lifted his leg up so that his boot rested on the edge of the coffee table, and went to begin cutting the slash in the fabric wider. There was blood caked all over the inside of Nero's leg, making it impossible to really assess the damage.

"Okay, I'll be right back with some water," Dante finally decided, hopping up and disappearing into the back room. Nero sighed and let his head fall back to rest against the back of the couch. He stared up at the ceiling, feeling somewhat picked-on by the universe and powers-that-be in general.

He looked up when Dante returned with a cup of water and a washcloth, the former of which he placed on the coffee table as he knelt between the other devil hunter's knees.

"I'll try to be gentle with you," he teased as he dipped the washcloth in the cup of water.

"Yes, please do," Nero said flatly as Dante started wiping the blood away. Some of it came of easily, but a lot of it was dried and he flinched as the cloth scrubbed a little too hard against the wound in his thigh. He could tell it had started healing because it didn't start bleeding again when Dante was a little too rough, but it was definitely tender.

"Sorry," Dante apologized when Nero flinched again, and he pulled away, "I mean, most of the blood's off now. It looks pretty good, considering."

Nero craned his neck down to get a look at the injury. It still wasn't entirely clean, but he could tell that it was mostly scabbed over now, which was a good sign, though the muscle ached when he tried to move his leg.

"Yeah, it'll probably be okay in another day," Nero estimated, letting his foot slide off the edge of the table and back onto the floor, "Got any pants I can borrow?...That aren't leather?"

Dante laughed, still kneeling between Nero's knees, "What's wrong with leather pants? You don't think they look good?"

_They look _great_ on you,_ Nero thought, but out loud he muttered with a shrug, "I like my clothing breathable."

"Okay, okay," the other man stood up finally and said, "I think I've probably got something…somewhere."

"You seriously aren't sure if you have anything constructed of a material other than leather?" Nero asked incredulously.

"Hey, it's a material I enjoy," Dante defended, "But sit tight, maybe you're in luck. You could always make those jeans into some nice cutoffs."

Luckily for Dante, he retreated into the back room again before Nero could chuck something at him. Nero waited for him to come back with something horrifying…and waited…and waited. Well, damn, Dante wasn't kidding after all. Nero wondered with dread what he would eventually turn up with. Each minute that passed without production of the garment added on to his trepidation.

Then the phone rang. Nero watched the back room, but Dante still had not emerged after the third ring, so with a sigh, the Knight got to his feet and hobbled over to the desk. He wasn't sure if he really should be touching the phone, but with Dante's line of work it could be a matter of life and death. He fell into the desk chair and grabbed the receiver.

"Devil…May Cry?" he mumbled into the mouthpiece, already thinking it was a bad idea to pick up the phone.

"_Hello, my name is Carl Clark…I was given this number by Romilda from the Magnolia East Lounge…_" the voice on the other line said, each syllable filled with hesitation and obvious doubt.

"Oh uh, listen I'm not—" Nero tried to interject, but the man continued as thought he hadn't heard Nero's interruption, clearly fueled by whatever desperation was overpowering his incredulity.

"_I own a nightclub on the Bottom Strip and we've had…well…"_ his voice dropped and Nero had to strain to hear the whisper, _"A murder."_

"Oh," Nero pinched the bridge of his nose, "Okay. Uh, I'm assuming since you got our number it's not something the police could handle…"

Wait, had he just said 'our number'? Since when did he consider this place his?

He tentatively added, "Could you…I dunno, describe what happened?"

The man on the other line hesitated, and then mumbled, _"No one really knows for sure. No one saw it. There was just…screaming but when we ran to see what had happened the body…"_

"Okay," Nero reassured the voice on the other line, thinking this sounded very familiar, "Give me the address and Dante will be down to check it out."

"_How long will that take?"_ the man asked, and Nero could hear the desperate near-panic in his voice.

"Uh, he'll be there tonight," the devil hunter guessed, hoping it wouldn't turn out to be a lie, "Try to keep people away from the…scene of the crime until then."

He jotted down the address when the man gave it, and then hung up with a sigh of relief. He didn't know how Dante did it. Answering the phone like that when a stranger could be calling about a body on the other line was just stressful.

"Hey don't get blood in my chair," Dante's voice came from behind him, and Nero looked around to see him standing there with a small bundle of clothes slung over one arm.

"Phone rang," Nero explained, "You were lost in your own laundry."

Dante snorted and dropped the collection of pants onto an arm of the couch and said, "You seemed to have everything handled. What happened now?"

"The angel killed someone else, as far as I can guess," answered the Knight bitterly, "Sounds like the same situation as what happened at the Magnolia East Lounge the other day. You want to go check it out now, or investigate that feather Cassius gave us first?"

"Ehh might as well check it out now," Dante shrugged, "Busy day today, huh?"

"Yeah that's one way to put it," Nero grumbled, leaning back in the desk chair and giving the pile of pants a cursory look.

"Hopefully there's something in there you can be _happy_ with," Dante said, picking up the address Nero had written off the desk and looking at it, "Oh I know where this place is. Got kicked out of there once I think…or was that the other place…Well whatever, don't burn the place down while I'm gone."

Nero rolled his eyes and waved goodbye as Dante departed, then got to his feet and limped back to the couch. When he put weight on his injured leg the wound twinged, but it was bearable now, at least. He picked up the clothing Dante had found him and carried it into the back room. With Dante gone he at least didn't have to worry about the man walking in on him, but he still didn't want to undress in the main room.

That, and there was still a decent amount of blood that needed washing off. Nero thought Dante might complain about the water bill, but it needed doing. He shut the door to the bathroom and dropped the pile of pants into the cleanest looking corner of floor before stripping off his coat and boots.

He unbuttoned his fly and gingerly peeled off his destroyed jeans, followed by his socks. He hadn't realized it until now, but his left boot had been pooling with blood, which he saw once getting a look at the now completely blood-stained sock. He hoped he hadn't just ruined his only pair of boots here because he didn't think Dante had any shoes he could borrow that would actually fit.

After he had discarded the offending sock, followed by its clean twin, he sat on the edge of the tub and twisted the knobs on the faucet until water poured out of the bottom nozzle in a thick stream, pounding down into the bottom of the tub. After a moment he rethought his plan, and decided since the water was running he might as well soak the blood off instead of scrubbing it, and found a stopper for the drain.

Once the water reached a satisfactory temperature he plugged the drain, undressing the rest of the way as the water filled the tub. Gingerly, he slipped inside, gritting his teeth as the warm water stung his wound for a moment before the sensation faded away as he got settled in the bath. He leaned his head against the back of the tub and relaxed, staring up at the water-stained ceiling and trying not to think about the multitude of worries plaguing his mind.

Closing his eyes, he took a few deep breaths and then looked down at the bath water which was turning pink as the blood on his leg started to dissolve into it. He grabbed the bar of soap and lifted his leg up so that his thigh was mostly out of the water, and started scrubbing the softened blood off his skin until the flesh was clean and the glistening red scab was the only evidence of the gash.

He was tempted to sit and soak for a few more minutes while Dante was out of the shop, but the hot water was making him feel sleepy and a little feverish. His stomach growled as well and he realized he hadn't eaten all day. It was only mid-afternoon, but after all the activity in the morning he realized now he was starving.

Leaning forward, he unplugged the drain and then stood up as the cloudy water started to swirl away. As he dried himself off, his gaze travelled to his boots, now filled with dried and drying blood, and then over to the small pile of pants Dante had collected for him. Nero guessed it was nice of Dante to put so much effort into picking out a few different options for him. He hoped the effort wasn't going to be wasted.

Once he was dry, he limped to the pile and picked up the top pair. They were black leather and honestly looked like something a biker would wear. Nero snorted and tossed them aside, hoping Dante had intended them as a joke.

The next pair of pants were jeans, which was reassuring, but the holes in the knees kept Nero from putting too much faith in them. He put them aside as well and picked up a pair of black track pants. There was no way he would wear them in public but he could always add them to his borrowed pajama set.

Finally he pulled out a pair of pants that looked suspiciously like violet suede, which was just something that baffled the imagination as to why on _earth_ Dante would own them, but they were soft and comfortable and definitely didn't chafe, so Nero settled on them for the time being until he could find a pair of jeans that wasn't riddled with holes.

Resolving to scrub the blood out of his boot after scrounging up some lunch, he went to exit the bathroom, but had to catch himself against the edge of the door frame, a sudden feeling of vertigo seizing him. He pressed a hand against his forehead, exhaling slowly. Suddenly, he felt terrible. The room spun and his head ached as though he had just slammed it against a wall. The tightness in his chest wouldn't let him catch his breath, and his skin burned.

"What the hell…?" he hissed, stumbling out into the main shop area and collapsing against the couch. He clung to the piece of furniture, feeling like it was trying to buck him off and into oblivion. Squeezing his eyes closed, he didn't realize it when he passed out.

* * *

There was a bird—a man-shaped bird with great white wings. The sun shone so brightly on him that Nero couldn't look at his face directly.

No…that wasn't quite right. _He _was the one shining, not the sun. A crown of light blazed above the bird's silver hair, blotting out all facial features in the glow.

The bird was sitting next to Nero, face turned upward toward the sky. He didn't speak, and after a moment, Nero followed his gaze upward to see what had his so rapt attention. But, he saw nothing out of the ordinary in the cloudless blue expanse. Looking back at the bird, at his pristine white wings, fanned open behind the both of them, he saw they cast no shadow against the grass on which they sat.

For a moment, the bird's name slipped through Nero's lips. He turned to look at Nero, and the Knight flinched for a second, expecting the light to blind him. Instead, the halo dimmed, and then shattered into stardust.

Blue, blue eyes stared back at him, wide and sad and full of fear. Tears like black ink slid down the white face. Lips moved, but no sound issued from them, and Nero watched as blood seeped through teeth instead of words, trickling down the bird's chin. The bloody mouth opened in a voiceless, scream.

Someone had ripped out the bird's tongue.

* * *

Nero felt like he was burning alive. Every sensation was like fire against his skin, and he rolled onto his back, a moan escaping his lips. Someone…Dante?...had draped a blanket over him while he had been unconscious, and he threw it off, sitting up slowly and clutching the side of his head as the room spun briefly.

Despite the fever, there was gooseflesh all over his bare torso, and he found himself shivering. What was wrong with him? Nero could only guess that something in his wound was infected; making him sick. He almost unbuttoned his pants to check right then before he realized he had an audience.

Dante waved at him, "Hey sleeping beauty. You look like shit."

"I feel like…like…" Nero's throat felt like sandpaper, and he put a hand over his mouth, a sudden wave of something flashing through his body. It wasn't nausea…what was it? His vision shimmered when he blinked and he felt a bead of sweat run down his collar bone.

He stood up, brushing sweat-drenched hair out of his eyes and then noticed his right arm. The Devil Bringer was blazing, normally blue light so bright that it burned completely white. And suddenly he felt…good. Energy coursed through him, living fire in his veins; _power._ Suddenly, Nero knew exactly what he wanted.

Before he realized he had crossed the room, he grabbed the front of Dante's jacket, and pulled the other half-devil into a kiss.

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

I feel like Nero spends an inordinate amount of time on personal hygiene in this fic. I dunno why he keeps ending up there. Sorry if you guys are getting sick of it. XD


	10. Evidence

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

Whew! Soooo sorry for the long wait everyone! I've been getting a steady stream of new followers this month so I dunno if ya'll could sence the update coming or what, but here it is! I honestly don't have an excuse other than being totally overwhelmed by con season and generally being DMC depressed (I'm sure I don't need to go into WHY). I just hope this chapter was worth the wait!

As always, beta read by my good friend Cerulean Twin

* * *

**Mission 10: Evidence**

* * *

Dante didn't react for a second after their lips had crashed together, but Nero didn't relent. There was no room for fear or doubt in his head next to the feverish heat. His grasp on Dante's lapels tightened, and soon enough the other half-devil responded to the kiss, parting his lips and leaning into the embrace.

It was a blur of passion inside Nero's head and he pressed in, feeling Dante's bare chest against his own. Dante's breath was hot and he could feel the other man's heartbeat thundering against his ribcage.

The world was spinning again, and finally Nero broke away, gasping for breath. He shivered, suddenly feeling weak, and…and…

Dante's strong arms caught him as he fell, and Nero blinked and suddenly he was on the couch again, gripping the other man's forearms as though afraid to let go. Slowly he let his hands slide free of Dante's wrists and he put a hand against his forehead, feeling the fever.

"Looks like there might have been some venom in that wound you got," Dante observed, looking partially amused and partially concerned. His lips were red and swollen from where Nero had kissed him so fiercely, but the man in red didn't look at all upset by their passionate exchange.

Nero shivered again, crossing his arms over his bare chest, still slick with sweat. He couldn't bring himself to apologize to Dante, didn't think he needed to. His thoughts were sluggish and he felt like he was drunk. Not that Nero had ever actually been drunk before, but what little part of him had the current ability to reason, reasoned this must be how it felt. Minus the horrible fever.

Dante slid his coat off his shoulders and draped it over Nero's shivering form. The warm leather of the garment was a relief, and Nero folded his arms inside it, closing his eyes and leaning his head back against the couch.

"Here," Dante's voice roused him a second later and he looked up to see that the other man was offering him a cup of water. Instead of taking it out of Dante's hand, he leaned forward and took a slurp out of the cup, unwilling to relinquish the warmth of the red coat.

The other devil hunter snorted, but obliged him, tilting the cup of water forward as Nero drained it.

"I think you'll probably be fine by tomorrow," Dante commented, setting the cup down and sitting next to him, "It seems like it's already working its way out of your system. But I guess I shouldn't say anything too important to you right now…you'll probably forget all about it by the time your fever cools off."

He leaned in until his lips brushed against Nero's ear and whispered, "But tomorrow maybe we can finish what you started."

* * *

The expression on Vergil's face was almost comical. Nero's waking hours were something of a blur, and he partially remembered the nightmares that had preceded them, but his horror over kissing Dante only slightly dampened the level of mirth caused by Vergil's reaction.

"I should kill you," the man in blue grumbled. One of his eyebrows was twitching.

"If I didn't know better, I'd say you were jealous," Nero observed cheekily.

Vergil crossed his arms and scowled at him, but didn't reply. Nero decided to let it go this time because he didn't really want to open that particular can of worms.

The silence between them stretched long and awkwardly, until finally Nero sighed and grumbled, "I don't even know what's happening. Why did I do that…?"

The man in blue shrugged one shoulder and theorized, "The venom from that demon weakened your inhibitions would be my guess. It's not as though it's never happened before."

"Ugh…what's Dante going to say when I wake up?" Nero groaned, covering his eyes.

"_Not_ that I'm supporting you two…having a thing," Vergil said thinly, looking pained, "But I doubt he minded all that much."

Nero looked back up at the other man and asked hopefully, "You think?"

"Well, I can say with confidence that I _do _know him rather well," Vergil answered with a 'you are so stupid' look.

"I don't need your lip," Nero replied coolly, looking up at the ceiling and feeling…relieved? To be honest he felt a little bit giddy.

* * *

Nero rolled over slightly and opened his eyes slowly. A pair of mismatched red and blue eyes met his gaze and he jerked backwards.

"L-Lady?" his voiced cracked embarrassingly as she leaned back away from him.

"Hi," she said, putting her hands on her hips as she surveyed him, "Dante called and asked me to keep an eye on you. He got called out again, but he should be back soon."

Nero rubbed his eyes, sitting up slowly and looking out the window. It was almost light outside, and he frowned, "How many hours did I sleep?"

"Hmm well the sun's about to go down, but I've only been here since around noon," she admitted.

"Shit…" he muttered, pushing Dante's coat off of him, and then pausing to look down at it, "So I've been asleep a whole day, and…Dante is out on the streets with no shirt."

She snorted, "He said you needed it more than he did. I think he was trying to be gallant, but that doesn't make him look any less like a male stripper."

Nero laughed, standing up and draping the coat over an arm of the sofa. Vertigo seized him for a second, but only briefly, and after a wobbly first step, he was fine.

"I need to get dressed," he grumbled, raking his human fingers through his hair and surveying the office. Nothing seemed out of place, which was moderately reassuring, "I didn't even get the chance to find out what happened at that other nightclub…"

He looked over to Lady and raised his eyebrows but she merely shrugged a shoulder and said, "Hey, don't look at me. I'm just here to babysit."

Nero rolled his eyes at 'babysit', but said nothing, instead continuing his track to the back room. Now seemed like a good time to try to scrub the blood out of his boot; he just hoped it wasn't ruined. Someone had washed his dirty clothing and piled it up on top of the dryer, so he grabbed his t-shirt and pulled it on over his head before zipping up his hoodie over it.

It seemed too late to save himself from contracting tetanus from walking barefoot over the office floor—or whatever it was you could catch from doing that—so he didn't bother to put anything on his bare feet. His boots were sitting along the wall in a strangely neat line along with several of Dante's own, and Nero picked them up. The one the blood had soaked into smelled like something had died in it, and the Knight grimaced, holding it away from his nose as he looked for something good to scrub it out with.

"Maybe it's time to invest in a new pair?" Lady suggested from the doorway, resting one shoulder against the frame, arms folded casually across her chest.

"Not gonna argue with you there," Nero muttered, opening up a cabinet.

"Plenty Dante's not using, why don't you steal a pair of his?" she continued, "You're already wearing his pants."

Nero's ears reddened at the pants comment, though he couldn't explain why, and he scowled, "I don't think they'll fit."

"Why not? You two look about the same size," the young woman queried.

"I feel weird about borrowing all this shit," he confessed, "Especially since I don't know how long I'll be stuc—staying here."

Lady scoffed, "I seriously doubt Dante will quibble over a pair of boots."

Nero frowned at the small row of shoes, "Well…yeah you're probably right."

He set his blood-soaked shoe down on top of the washing machine and went over to examine his options. Two pairs of the boots were black, which Nero crossed off in his mind for reasons other than the fact that they didn't match his belt or holsters. Or so he told himself.

The pair he settled on were the color of teak, vaguely Western but not obscenely so that zipped up the back of the leg, with a thin strap buckled at the ankle and another at the top just below where his knee would be. All in all sufficiently stylish without too much of that chaps flaunting flare Dante seemed to have developed in Nero's native timeline.

He held them up for Lady's benefit before setting them on top of the dryer next to his old shoe and beginning the hunt for a clean pair of yet-to-be-ruined socks that he could commandeer.

"Mm I've never seen those before," she mused, "Though considering the fact that Dante tends to pick an outfit and then wear it until it disintegrates off his body, I guess that's not saying much."

Nero snorted, but didn't say anything. Finally he retrieved a pair of socks from a basket of what _smelled_ like clean laundry and yanked them on. Once he had sufficiently tucked and smoothed them under the hems of his borrowed pants, he grabbed the boots again and tried them on.

After a brief walk around the laundry room, he stopped, looked at Lady, and shrugged. "Seem pretty good to me," he concluded.

As if on cue, his stomach rumbled.

"Oh, Dante left a pizza for you," Lady said, "Sorry I forgot to tell you when you woke up. But I thought you might be sick of pizza so I brought you some Chinese too. You can pay me back later."

Nero grinned, "Thanks, Lady. That's nice of you."

She shrugged one shoulder and turned away, but not before Nero caught site of her blush, "Just…eat your food. I'm going to take off now since you seem lucid and minimally brain-damaged. The smell of that food had been making me nauseous."

"Oh, uh, okay?" Nero blinked, slightly confused by the abruptness of it.

"Tell Dante I'm taking some time off demon hunting," she added at the shop exit, "So if he needs me I may not be reachable."

"O…kay," Nero said, but she had already shut the door behind her.

True to her word, she had left several cartons of Chinese food sitting on top of a pizza box in the fridge, so Nero retrieved them and after a few moments wrestling with the microwave, he settled into the chair behind Dante's desk and started shoving food into his mouth with a pair of chopsticks.

He finished off the first carton in record time, but as he was reaching for the second the phone rang. For a moment he debated the worth of answering it, but finally decided it could be important, and picked it up, "Devil May Cry…"

"_Wow, Nero,"_ Dante's voice crackled on the other end, sounding amused, _"You're gonna chase customers away with that attitude."_

"What customers," Nero quipped.

Dante laughed, _"Touché. Anyways, Lady just gave me a call and said you seemed okay. I'm about a half hour away. I hope she took good care of you?"_

"Yeah. Oh she said not to call her for a while because she's taking some time off," Nero added while her words were still fresh in his mind, "She seemed sort of on edge."

"_Probably because she doesn't want to get mixed up with this angel thing,"_ Dante guessed, _"I don't blame her. Lady only hunts demons as a rule so this gig is pretty much as far outside of her thing as it could get."_

"That makes sense I guess…" Nero mumbled, putting the receiver between his ear and his shoulder and stirring his carton of food with the chopsticks, "Oh also I stole a pair of your boots. Mine were sort of ruined."

"_What's mine is yours,"_ Dante dismissed, _"Just don't touch my swords."_

The Knight rolled his eyes, "As if I'd want to."

There was a vaguely awkward silence for a moment, filled only with the crackling at the end of the other line, and Nero's mind wandered back to their kiss…

"So what happened with that nightclub owner last night?" he asked sharply.

"_Oh! I meant to tell you about that. Same M.O. I pocketed a few more feathers. They should be in the top left drawer in the desk, by the way. Take a look at them after I hang up and see what you think. The one your friend gave us is in there too, so maybe you can use that to jumpstart the Tear."_

"Cassius is _not_ my friend, Dante," Nero growled, setting down the food and scowling at the aforementioned desk drawer.

"_Yeah, yeah, sorry. I forgot how touchy you are,"_ Dante replied, not sounding particularly sorry at all, _"I'll see you in a bit."_

Nero hung up the phone and yanked the drawer open. Surprisingly, the other half-devil had had the forethought to organize the feathers in little labeled plastic bags, so Nero pulled them all out and set them down on top of the desk.

"Well, Dante, you have been busy…" he mused, picking up the baggie with the singular white feather labeled '_Cassius'_ and turning it over for a second before picking up the other two.

One bag was labeled _'East Lounge 1' _and the second was labeled _'Wild Things 1'_ which Nero assumed was the name of the second nightclub. Pretty lame name, in his opinion.

The feathers contained in the two baggies from the nightclubs were dirty and bloodstained, small and blunt, as opposed to the pristinely white quill-like one Cassius had given them. Nero scowled at the feathers. It didn't add up now that he actually had a chance to think about it and focus. Why were the feathers from the two nightclubs still filthy?

Pondering this, Nero retrieved a carton of Chinese food once more and continued to eat while he waited for Dante to return. In addition to settling what had happened when Nero had been half delirious, which he was not looking forward to, now they had this ridiculous puzzle on their hands. It was getting on his nerves more and more.

Fuck puzzles. Puzzles sucked. And riddles. Fuck riddles. Nero hated having to solve bullshit riddles, and if he fucked it up some stupid swarm of demons would drop out of the sky _just_ to make his life difficult…

Nero sighed and leaned back, trying to think about something that wouldn't raise his blood pressure. He wondered what was happening back in Fortuna. Or, forward in Fortuna? Were his fellow Knights aware of this fiasco or were they just frozen forever in time at that event? A better question: why the hell was Nero thinking about this crap?

Dante arrived before Nero had too much time to drive himself insane, but plenty of time to nearly make himself sick on the huge amount of Chinese food Lady had provided. The man in red walked into the office just in time to hear Nero let out huge belch.

"I'll give you an A for body, but a C- for execution," Dante quipped, striding in through the door in all his shirtless glory. Bastard.

Nero rolled his eyes, "Oh shut up."

"I see you've been busy," the other young man observed, nodding toward the cluster of empty Chinese food cartons.

"Lady brought them for me. Funnily enough it occurred to her that I might want to eat something other than pizza."

"Ohh I see. Well that's fine. _I'll _eat the pizza," Dante replied.

"You do that," Nero agreed, before turning his attention toward the feathers sorted on the desk, "So I looked at these like you asked."

Dante raised his eyebrows and leaned over the desk from the side opposite of Nero, "Oh yeah? Then I'm sure you reached the same conclusion I did."

"We need to pay another visit to the Magnolia East lounge," Nero answered, picking up the real angel feather and frowning at it, "It was the first murder that thing did that we know of and these feathers don't match up with the ones we _know _came from the angel. Someone's lying to us, and for once I don't think it's Cassius."

"That's what I thought too," agreed Dante, "First thing when the sun comes up, I say we go check it out. You feel up to it?"

"Hell yes," Nero grinned, "Lady says I slept almost twenty-four hours, I'm ready to do it now!"

The other devil hunter shrugged as he went to get his coat off of the couch, "I think it'd be the best thing to go during the day. Things tend to be easier to see in the sunlight and we might spot something we've missed. And most of the time you've been asleep I've been running around town putting down the rest of those batty wolf demons. Which, by the way, is getting boring."

He donned his coat with a flourish and concluded with finality, "So we're waiting 'til tomorrow."

Nero leaned back in the chair, disappointed, though it made sense, "The sun only just went down, we've got so much time to kill…"

Dante grinned at him, and quite suddenly was leaning over him, hands on the armrests of the chair on either side of Nero, "I can think of a few ways to kill some time. You sorta left me hanging there yesterday, you know."

Heat crept up Nero's neck and face, and he leaned back away as much as the chair would allow, "Look, I—I didn't—"

The other man moved away from him again, cocking his head to one side and standing with his hands on his hips, "Alright, fine. Be sexually repressed. Why don't we duke it out, then?"

Nero blinked and after a beat managed, "What?"

"Spar," Dante clarified, "I've got some practice equipment around here somewhere—well, they're actually just some metal pipes but we both heal quick. What do you say?"

Sparring actually sounded much more in line with what Nero was comfortable doing, so he hopped out of the desk chair and grinned, "Sure, sounds like fun. Don't cry if I beat you too bloody."

"Likewise," Dante answered airily as he sent the desk Nero had just been sitting behind sliding across the room and out of the way with one push. The action opened up the office area, giving them a good amount of room to go wild, and Nero observed the space as Dante left to retrieve the 'sparring equipment'.

He just might be in trouble.

"Catch!" called the other man as he tossed a pipe to Nero. Nero Snatched it out of mid-air before transferring it to his left hand.

"That is quite the handy trick," Dante commented as he tossed his own weapon in the air and caught it again, "How does it work? I've been wondering."

"I don't really know, honestly," Nero answered, "There was an accident with a demon about a year ago when I was protecting Ky—someone, and after that day I've had this arm. He sent it flashing out to Snatch Dante off the ground and held him in the air for a second before dropping the man.

"Ha…wow," Dante landed on his feet, looking surprised, "Wow."

"I think maybe it would be a good idea if I didn't use it in our sparring match," Nero suggested.

"Yeah maybe that would be good," the man in red agreed as he shrugged off his coat and tossed it out of the way.

"Didn't you just put that back on?" Nero asked, incredulous.

Dante laughed, "Hey I plan to work up a sweat here. And this way you can get a better look at what you're missing out on."

Nero blushed, and huffed, "Let's just fight."

Without any further encouragement, Dante lunged at him, and Nero brought his weapon up to block the other's with a clang. He riposted a second later, swinging at the red devil's side, but Dante's parry stopped him.

They danced around the shop like that for who knew how long, both landing blows and blocking them until they were both panting, and sweating, and bleeding. Neither of them had had back much after the initial few steps, if at all. Dante had been kind enough not to go for Nero's head, but the Knight had not returned the courtesy, and the son of Sparda was now bleeding from a glancing blow to his cheek.

They grinned viciously at each other as they each caught their breath and waited for wounds to stop bleeding. Dante wiped the blood off of his cheek, and rested his pipe on one bare shoulder. Sweat glistened on his chiseled naked chest.

Nero swept his sweaty hair out of his eyes and transferred his weapon into his right hand so he could flex the bleeding knuckles that had gotten in the way of Dante's pipe.

And then they were fighting again in a flash, Nero's human fist connecting with Dante's jaw as the devil hunter had sent a thrust toward Nero's midsection. They spun around and before Nero knew it his back had crashed into the hard floor beneath the other man. And suddenly Dante was kissing him, weapons forgotten, with the taste of blood on his lips.

They fought with their tongues this time, wrestling for dominance as Dante's explored Nero's mouth. He felt the heat of the other man's chest pressed against his own through the fabric of his t-shirt and hoodie, and suddenly he was fighting to get them off, his own hands fumbling along with Dante's at the zipper and then after that at the hem of his shirt until finally his own naked chest was flush with Dante's.

They wrestled around on the floor until Nero was the one who had Dante pinned, straddling the other half-devil as they feverously kissed. He could feel Dante's hands scrabbling over his back before grasping tightly at Nero's hips, thumbs looped into his waistband and starting to tug it down.

"S-Stop…" Nero grunted, pulling back, panting this time from lack of air rather than their fight, "I'm not…I haven't…"

The words wouldn't articulate though the thickness of his tongue and swollen lips. His mouth was bleeding, but when had Dante bitten him? Nero found he didn't mind that much.

Dante's chest was heaving too and he propped himself up on one elbow, tracing a finger over Nero's hip-bone. The feather-light touch sent a shiver through the Knight's body and his pants were beginning to feel uncomfortably tight.

"Don't worry about a thing, Nero," Dante purred, sitting up and kissing him again, this time gently, running a tongue along Nero's bottom lip and licking the blood from it.

Nero leaned into his kiss once more, feeling himself trembling but unable to control it. Dante ran a hand slowly down Nero's side before reaching down to unfasten the young man's fly, followed by his own.

With a shiver, Nero leaned into the other half-devil, a moan escaping his lips as Dante reached into his pants and caressed him. He felt himself grow hard under the other young man's more experienced fingers as Dante pulled Nero's cock free. He continued to stroke Nero with one hand, and with his other he pulled his own stiff length from his trousers.

Nero's head drooped as the other man stroked him, and his forehead came to rest in the crook of Dante's shoulder. Harsh panting breaths escaped his mouth, tempered every now and then with a soft moan. His hips began to move in time with Dante's hand, but after a moment Nero opened his eyes and slowly reached down to caress the other demon hunter's erection.

Dante's hand faltered on Nero at the touch, but his cock responded, and together the two men stroked each other. Nero's hips ground slightly against Dante's, and the red twin slipped his free hand into the back of the young Knight's trousers, probing fingers eliciting a gasp from the other half devil.

In a flash, Nero released with a cry, scattering white fluid over both of their stomachs. Dante kissed him hungrily, and his climax followed seconds later.

Nero fell against him and they both sank to the floor, panting. A laugh escaped his lips, giddiness overcoming him in the euphoric after-effects of their pleasure.

Dante was grinning at him.

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

So, yep there it is! And for the record I hate writing smut. I don't know how people do it as their primary writing topic but hats off! Anyways, we're in the home stretch now, so thank you for sticking with me, all you lovely people who have been here since the beginning! Just two or three more chapters to go and this thing'll be done!

ALSO, this is old news to a few of you but for those who aren't familiar with my deviantart, I posted this piece in companionship to the previous chapter a couple months back.

samlet bird dot deviant art (dotcom) /art /Bath-321346234

Remove the spaces and replace those dots with actual periods and remove the parentheses. Sorry for making it stupidly confusing by FFnet is making it more difficult to post links.

Yes, I have changed my deviantart handle to Samletbird! But you should still be able to find it with the old one, though I think Samletbird is easier to spell/remember. XDD

NOW THEN, until next time! I love you all!


	11. Indigo

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

I always feel really guilty when I get a ton of favorites and watches in the months between updates. Like I said before, we're pretty much in the home stretch now! Hang in there with me everybody! There WILL be an update next Monday as well because I already have the next chapter written.

And, as always, beta read by my good friend Cerulean Twin.

* * *

**Mission 11: Indigo**

* * *

Nero and Dante rose early the next morning. Nero's body ached where bruises were still healing from their sparring match the previous evening, but it was easy enough to ignore. He doubted they would still be troubling him by the end of the day.

Both demon hunters had a few slices of pizza for breakfast before getting dressed and armed.

"Could be a pretty interesting day," Dante commented as they both mounted his motorcycle. Nero wrapped his arms around the other devil hunter's waist.

Dante gunned the engine and they rocketed away from the curb, weaving into traffic and following the road toward the Magnolia East Lounge. But, somewhat expectedly, they didn't make it before being accosted by demons. The giant wolf-bat creatures started on their tail at about the halfway point and Dante swerved to avoid one dive-bombing them.

"Keep driving!" Nero shouted into the other man's ear as he ripped Blue Rose from its holster and shot one of the demons out of the sky. Another tried to fly into them again but Nero Snatched it out of the air and used his demonic spectral hand to crush it to death.

Nero fired a couple more shots at their pursuers before gripping the motorcycle with his Devil Bringer for balance as he clambered around so that he was facing their rear. He didn't doubt Dante would manage any forward assailants.

The wind whipped around them as Nero brought down another flying demon, its body crashing into a parked car. The car's alarm wailed for a second before the sound was lost as they sped away. Behind him Nero heard the sound of Ivory, rapidly firing, and a second later he was nearly thrown off as they swerved violently around a demonic body on the asphalt.

"What the hell is up with this shit?!" Nero shouted over his shoulder as he gunned another one down, "They just keep coming!"

"Look like we're on the right track!" Dante yelled back, a wild grin on his face.

Nero sighed, but it _did _make sense. Whatever these things served didn't want them going back to re-investigate. He did his best to hold on as they skidded around a sharp turn, watching as several of their pursuers crashed into the side of a building with an explosion of bloody finality.

Dante hit the brakes and Nero slammed into his back, knocking Dante forward over the handlebars, but the red devil managed to bring the bike to a halt without crashing. As they stopped, Nero slid off the back of the bike, launching into a forward roll and then firing on another demon as it swooped in, thinking he was an easy target.

Together he and Dante decimated the stragglers from their demonic pursuers. Finally, the creatures stopped coming, and the two demon hunters had a breather.

"Well," Dante said, holstering his firearm with a flourish. "I'd say we're definitely in the right place. Not too smart of 'em, chasing us right to this place."

The son of Sparda looked up at the glowing Magnolia East Lounge sign for a moment before opening the door and grinning at Nero, "After you, sweetheart."

The Knight gave the other man a black look before shoving Blue Rose into its holster and complying. During the daytime the club was mostly empty apart from a few die-hard patrons and the bartender wiping down the bar with a rag.

As soon as the door swung shut behind the two half-devils, they were intercepted by Romilda. The establishment's owner was dressed less lavishly in her day-wear than she had been upon their previous visit. In a black women's business suit she looked much less glamorous and much more like the smart entrepreneur that she must be in order to run such a successful nightclub.

"I wasn't expecting the two of you back so soon," she said as greeting before adding the query, "What's wrong?"

"Oh, we'd just like to take another look out back," Dante said airily, but Nero noticed the way the man in red's eyes narrowed slightly upon seeing the older woman's approach, "I'm sure during the day like this, you've got more important things to be doing than watching us…don't worry about it."

The woman's face was unreadable, but she replied, "I don't know if you'll find much. The crime scene has been cleaned…"

Dante shrugged and brushed past her, Nero following a second later. He threw a glance over his right shoulder as they made their way out, but Romilda's face was cast in shadow.

"She seemed a little…odd," the Knight observed as he pulled the door shut behind them and stepped out into the alleyway.

"Well, she's a suspect now," Dante replied, surveying their surroundings with his hands on his hips. "She's been running this club for ages, it's sort of wild to think of her being some sort of evil mastermind but…stranger things I guess."

The idea of a massive demonic tower suddenly thrusting forth from the middle of the city ranked pretty high on _Nero's _'stranger things that have happened in Dante's town' list, and he hadn't even _seen_ the Temen-ni-gru; only the barren spot where it had sunk into the ground.

Dante jumped down from the back stoop and approached the spot where they had found the body previously. It was true the area had been cleaned, but there was still a dark stain on the side of the building and in the pavement where the center of the gore had been.

"It doesn't look like there's much left to look at," Nero complained.

"That's because she's covering her tracks…" answered Dante as he ran his fingers over the stain thoughtfully.

Quite suddenly, Nero's Devil Bringer began to glow more brightly. It was subtle at first so he didn't notice it, but after a moment he looked down at it in puzzlement, "That's…odd."

And then the white hairs on the back of the Knight's neck started to stand on end. A feeling of cold dread slid down his spine as he saw the look on Dante's face as the man in red's eyes travelled over Nero's shoulder.

"Shit, it's right behind me, isn't it," he managed to say before the world turned upside down and blood blinded him.

* * *

Vergil's face was colorless as it hovered above Nero. The Knight's vision swam, blurry, and he…he couldn't move? The man in blue was saying something, his lips _were moving_, but Nero couldn't…hear him.

The opera house was too bright. All of the stained glass windows had shattered.

* * *

Vergil opened his eyes. Slowly the world slid into focus. He was on his side in a pool of blood—his? No, not his. Not technically, though it belonged to the body he was in. There was shouting, and someone was standing between this body and…?

Oh, yes, Nero's attacker. The _angel._ What was its name…Remiel?

Vergil rolled over slightly and slowly sat up, feeling the massive hole in his sternum knit itself back together. He reached up to wipe the blood from his forehead with his right hand before stopping short, the blue glow catching his eye, and he stopped to investigate the demonic appendage.

He could feel the soul in it, trapped and dazed and maybe dying—Nero's soul, his host. He could also feel something else, less deep and just waiting to be let out. It wasn't a soul, or Yamato which he would easily had identified. It was…that vile gem the little brat had stored in this beautiful arm. The piece of the angel.

Vergil scowled at the taloned hand he now possessed, and then turned his gaze upward toward Dante's back. His foolish twin was standing between Vergil and the two figures that had invaded their space—the angel and his…what? His servant? His lover? The blue devil brushed the detail aside. It was of little importance anyway.

Finally, Vergil stood, brushing the hair backwards from his eyes in a practiced flourish as he did so. The motion caught the attention of all three other men—if the angel counted as a man—and Dante had half-turned just in time to take Yamato in the gut.

His eye widened in shock as Vergil ripped the katana out again and then kicked his twin in the chest, sending him flying into the side of the building with a loud _CRASH!_

"Nero—what are—" the human gasped but Remiel's skeletal wig flared out in front of the youth and he fell silent. Scum.

With a flick of his new glowing blue wrist, Yamato re-absorbed itself into his arm, and the Tear of the Fallen took its place. It glowed in his palm faintly and Vergil held it out to the angel, "This is what you've been looking for isn't it?"

He knew the angel couldn't see it, but any supernatural being that powerful would sense the object from miles away. The level of sanity the broken thing still possessed was dubious at best but it would doubtlessly know a gift when it saw it. Metaphorically speaking, of course.

The angel's lips split over its teeth in what might nearly have been a smile, and it whispered, "A demon freely offers me this thing…what changed so suddenly, Son of Sparda."

Vergil tilted his head to the side and mused, "A deal. Or, a contract, if you will." Off to the side, Dante was crawling out of the rubble, Vergil needed to be quick. "Give me my own body back in exchange for your Tear returned."

But, whatever answer Remiel might have given him, Vergil didn't hear it. An unholy scream broke the tension-filled air and something monstrous swooped down on them from above. Vergil re-absorbed the abominable holy relic in a split-second and dodged out of the way at the demon crashed into the pavement where he had been standing only a moment before.

The angel snarled at it, torn wings unfurling behind it aggressively. Slowly, the trespasser stood. Her black hair fell in curls across her face, skin white as bone apart from the blood-colored scars that marred her cheeks like carved tears. Her bat-like double-set of wings were black and edged with razor-like claws that matched the draconic ones on her feet. Her spine rose up out of her back in jagged bony spikes, extending outward into a long wicked-looking tale with a vicious barb at the end. And, a horrible stench rolled from her, like rotting meat and bile, and burning things.

"You give me that Tear," she hissed through black pointed teeth at Vergil, extending a clawed hand toward him. "And I won't tear you all into shreds."

As she spoke she sent Remiel flying with the flick of one massive wing, and half of the building next to the club collapsed under the impact. Cassius—yes, that was his name, Vergil finally remembered—who had been standing beside the angel was frozen with shock. Foolish little human, and little better than a pet really.

Vergil looked at the demon for a moment before asking, "Why?"

She blinked at him, looking taken-aback that her violent display had not cowed him, but she humored him a moment later, "I need it to re-ascend. I lost my own when I Fell. It's not really a Tear you know—it's an angel's holy soul. If I have it I can be a true angel again."

"You can't!" the human shouted, and Vergil blinked in surprised, not having expected such a weak being to speak up against a…_fallen angel._ "Only God can give you back what you lost, you fucking bitch."

"For once I'd say I gotta agree with the kid. And, Romilda, I really liked you better as a nightclub owner. This new look really doesn't do anything for your complexion." Dante said as he approached, scratching his stomach where Yamato had pierced it and then giving Vergil a sidelong look, "You and I are gonna have a long damn talk after this is over."

Vergil didn't deign to even acknowledge the foolish idea, and he really didn't have a chance to because 'Romilda' was spitting venom, shrieking, "You give me the Tear, demon, and maybe I'll spare your life! All of my plans fell through but this thing I will still have!"

She lunged for Vergil but he sidestepped—really who did she think he was?—and a second later Yamato slid into his hand as smoothly as a lover.

"Perhaps we should first discuss why you gave my sword away to this little bastard?" he quipped to his twin as he sidestepped another lunge.

"'Perhaps' the two of your can pay attention to what's happening right in front of you!" the black-haired youth barked at them as he circled to the other side of the Fallen Angel.

"Tetchy little brat isn't he," Dante muttered under his breath as he pulled the Rebellion off his back with a flourish.

Vergil didn't respond. Dante was much younger than when they had last crossed blades. It had seemed like an eternity since Vergil had been possessed of an in-tact train of thought in the real world…but this Dante was certainly younger. Temen-ni-gru had only just fallen in this timeline after all, Vergil remembered discussing it briefly with his rather disagreeable host.

Romilda screamed at them, a long unearthly bellow that made Vergil's head ring. He saw Cassius stagger, a hand pressed to the side of his head and the boy in white nearly dropped his gunblade.

Vergil flashed forward and swung Yamato with lightning speed, catching the Fallen off guard and she stumbled back a step. Cassius jumped out of the way as the creature that had been Romilda threw open her massive wings again and leapt into the sky. As she did so the air around her began to darken, and a poisonous purple glow started to swirl malignantly around her clawed hands. A second later she shot a bolt of lightning down at him and Vergil spun out of the way.

An explosion rocked the area, and for a brief second the cerulean twin thought the source had been the lightning bolt, but then he saw the rubble that had flown out of their adjacent building and the injured Remiel taking to the sky after it.

All three men on the ground watched at the insane angel flew straight into the Fallen, crashing into her in an explosion of bloody feathers and gore. The demonic lightning crackled around them for a second before the sound of Cassius' gunblade went off like a canon shot. The shell exploded through one of Romilda's right wings, taking a huge chunk of leathery flesh with it, but the injury didn't seem to be much more than an annoyance to her.

She dropped out of the sky, leaving Remiel above them hovering blindly for a confused second before Cassius' scream split the air. Romilda rose high into the sky one more, soaring with the young Knight clutched in her wicked talons. The claws were digging gouges out of the youth's flesh and staining his already dirty whites with his own fresh blood but he wasn't screaming because of the pain. It was the height.

"Shit!" Dante cursed, throwing Rebellion back onto his back and drawing Ebony in a heartbeat, aiming high at the still-climbing Romilda.

But, he couldn't shoot without a good chance of her dropping the human to plummet to his death. Vergil scowled, it was just like Dante to worry about collateral damage. But, Vergil recalled this Devil Bringer arm having a handy ability to grab things out of mid-air. If they were going to get _anything _accomplished in this battle he might as well go along with it.

Remiel collided with Romilda again, upsetting these plans very suddenly. They were so high now that the wind had nearly completely washed away the terrified screams coming from Cassius, but not quite. Vergil almost felt sorry him. Almost.

The collision has loosened the Fallen Angel's grip on the youth however, and suddenly he was plummeting through the air. Vergil was honestly a little relieved, the human would be out of the way at any rate—what did he care now?

A wave of dizziness suddenly broke over the demon in blue, and without his control his right arm shot out and Snatched the falling Cassius right out of the air before dropping him to safety in a shivering, sobbing, bleeding heap. But, alive.

And Vergil was reminded of just who this body actually belonged to.

The two angels were fighting in the air again but before long Romilda descended once more—and right into Dante's gunfire. She shrieked in pain as the bullets exploded through her wings. Ivory was in the red devil's other hand now and he fired of bullet after bullet, not stopping until the vicious creature's wings were bloody bony pulp. She crashed into the earth with a wail of pain, and dust rose around her still form.

Remiel landed with barely more grace, staggering and bleeding and snarling, insanity reining his senses until Cassius croaked, "Remiel…that's it…please stop that song…"

Song? Vergil hadn't even noticed a song until the human had brought his attention to it. But, there is was sure enough, in the back of his head like a faint hum of energy, a song-like aura emanating from the angel. Very interesting.

"That was…easier then I was expecting," Dante said as he watched the dust cloud rise before turning his attention toward Vergil. "Now what exactly do you think you're doing…with Nero's body."

Vergil didn't even bother to feign impressed surprise that his younger twin had noticed the change so easily—as if the stabbing hadn't been tell enough. He would be ashamed, well more ashamed then he already was, to call Dante his twin if the red devil couldn't even figure out that much.

The blue devil had a brief flashback to Mallet Island, but he shoved that train of thought away.

"You—Remiel was it?" Vergil called to the angel, totally ignoring his twin's query, and calling the Tear back into his demonic hand, "Let's finish this now."

In the blink of an eye, the angel right in front of him, not even a pace away, and out of instinct Vergil moved out of the way, barely dodging one of Remiel's blind slashes. It was no use, he realized, the idiotic thing was still in the throes of its battle rage.

And here in Nero's body, Vergil couldn't even teleport. How troublesome.

He side-stepped another swipe, and sighed, shooting a comment toward the human that was still quaking on the ground, "Can't you do something to control this thing?"

Cassius glared at him through a curtain of black bangs and spat, "Fuck you."

"Wow, kid really doesn't have any sense of humor," Dante commented airily, "I'd hate to get into a snark-match with him. It'd be hella' boring just shouting 'fuck you's back and forth."

"You are so pedestrian," Vergil replied to his twin before tossing the Tear at the young Knight.

Cassius caught it out of reflex, looking surprised for a moment, but he picked himself off the pavement finally and examined the glowing relic briefly. Finally he looked up at Vergil and asked, "What exactly do you expect me to do with this?"

"You're the angel's pet aren't you? Make it see reason," Vergil sighed, feeling as usual, that he was surrounded by utter fools.

The human sighed dramatically and tentatively called out to the angel who had turned its aggressive attentions on Dante in the meantime, "Uh, R-Remiel!"

The reaction wasn't immediate, but after a second, the angel's attacks slowed, and finally it stopped and turned around toward the sound of Cassius' voice. The human looked a little nervous, and Vergil surmised that must be because his 'friend' wasn't always so considerate of the fragile human form. But the angel didn't attack him, and as he limped slowly toward the Knight, Vergil noticed the golden sword on Remiel's back between his ragged wings.

Clearly Dante noticed it too because he said, "Huh, I was wondering where that had gotten to. I guess Remiel's Bell really _was_ a sword…"

Before Vergil could question him, the sound of rubble collapsing crashed through the alley, and high shrieking laugh rose up. Something shot through Cassius' chest like a skewer, going on to impale the angel in front of him and barely missing Dante and Vergil as both of Sparda's sons dove to either side out of the way.

Romilda's bony tail yanked back out of both angel and human, taking the Tear with its wicked barbed end. Remiel staggered, blood rolling down its chest, but the angel didn't seem much affected from gaping wound. Cassius was not so lucky. The human crashed to his knees, gaping at the steaming saucer-sized hole in his chest before pitching forward onto the concrete in a limp sprawl.

"I can't believe how easy you made this for me!" the Fallen screamed at them triumphantly as she climbed out of the rubble, grabbing the Tear from the tip of her tail and laughing again as she thrust the Tear into her chest cavity. "It was like…well forgive me for this cliché but…it was like taking candy from a baby!"

"Did she really just say that…?" Dante muttered, but his face was hard as he glared at the Fallen Angel.

Something stirred in Vergil's chest then. He couldn't remove his eye from the stupid human's corpse on the ground. It didn't bother him in the least so why—why?!

Quite abruptly the Devil Bringer swung up and smashed its fist into Vergil's face, sending him flying backward into the hard ground in a spray of blood.

* * *

The irksome kid was glaring at him when Vergil awoke in the Opera House. Vergil's head spun when he tried to stand, so he stayed where he was.

"I guess you think you're pretty clever, huh," Nero sneered at him, mis-matched arms crossed over his chest, "Just when I was starting to trust you, you finally show me your true colors."

Vergil shook his head, running a hand through his hair before speaking, "You would never understand."

"Yeah, maybe I wouldn't. But it's a sure way to make sure I won't if you don't even try to work with me," the youth replied, "Trying to give that crazy angel the Tear of the Fallen, and…getting Cassius killed…that just makes no goddamn sense but…"

Vergil waited silently for the other end of that 'but'.

Nero uncrossed his arms and looked down at his Devil Bringer. "But I think if we want to get anything done now, we have to work together. I didn't mean to keep you trapped here, Vergil. I didn't even realize just how…real you were, I guess."

And then he held out the demonic arm, offering his hand to Vergil, "Please, lend me your power one more time." And after a second's hesitation, the blue devil took it.

* * *

**To Be Continued**

* * *

Well here we are! The final chapter will be coming next week! Is everyone as excited at I am? This journey has been nearly a year long but this is the first multi-chapter fanfic that I will have ever completed! I feel like that's pretty impressive if I do say so myself hehe. As always reviews are highly valued! I will be very interested to hear the opinions of all this shit that just hit the fan here. Until next week, adieu!


	12. Finale

_Disclaimer_: I neither own Devil May Cry, nor do I make profit from my fanfiction of it. If I did, I would be rich. Or, at least slightly less poor. The original characters that appear in this story are mine, however, and I would appreciate them not being reused by anyone. (I say as though anyone gives a shit about my OCs XD)

Beta read by my friend CeruleanTwin who has very graciously stuck with me this whole time!

* * *

**Mission 12: Finale**

* * *

It started with a spark of blue, and then a blaze. Nero's limp body had only just hit the ground before it began swimming with azure energy, and suddenly rocketed upward from the pavement, heat and energy rolling off in waves. Behind him the silhouette of a massive armored devil materialized, Yamato in hand as the blade slid into Nero's own palm.

Nero fixed glowing red eyes on Dante and grinned, and when he spoke his voice rippled with the blue energy charged around him, "Sorry about the bullshit Dante. Whaddya say we kick this crazy bitch's ass."

Dante took it in stride and laughed, nodding, "I say let's party!"

Red energy blazed around the crimson hunter as he released his own Devil Trigger with a laugh.

"If you're not gonna help, then get outta the way!" Nero shouted at Remiel as both devils blasted by the unmoving angel. It hadn't moved from the spot where it had been impaled with Cassius, and though its face was unreadable, Nero almost thought he could sense the devastated shock that had frozen it.

He turned his attention back to Romilda who was regenerating her wings and transforming into something…else. Her dark hair lost all color, fading to white, and then quite strangely to blue. As her wings grew back they too were white with azure tips. The Tear glimmered tauntingly in her chest, blue veins spidering out from its core across her pale flesh. She grinned at the two devils as they charged her, and took to the sky.

Nero ripped Blue Rose from its holster and fired on her, trying to take out her wings before she got too high. Dante had the same idea and was rapid-firing with Ebony and Ivory—though rather than bullets, they too were now firing energy blasts.

Together the two half-devils, with a little help from Nero's Summoned Swords as well, managed to once more reduce the Fallen Angel's wings to bleeding ruin and she crashed into the ground. Nero and Dante leapt forward to attack while she was down, but it didn't last long as suddenly her tail whipped around and they were forced to leap out of the way or risk getting skewered.

She snarled at them, and fired a beam of energy at them from the Tear in her chest before leaping into the sky again and beginning to rain lightning down.

"I'm thinking we need to take out the Tear," Dante guessed.

Nero hesitated. Without it, they would have no bargaining piece with the angel…if they even still had a chance but…he couldn't stab Vergil in the back like that.

"Don't concern yourself with me," Vergil's voice spoke, from the blue energy coursing around Nero, and suddenly the blue devil walked out into the air, formed entirely of the crackling sapphire force that still surrounded Nero. The spirit of Dante's twin stood in mid-air for a second, eyes meeting with his brother's, before he launched into the sky like a bolt of indigo lightning.

"What is he—" Nero started, but he couldn't finish the sentence before Vergil's spirit collided with their opponent's chest. The blowback from the impact sent Dante and Nero flying, and shook the buildings around them and the earth below them. Nero saw the Tear shatter into a thousand shards as Vergil's ghostly version of Yamato pierced through it and came out Romilda's back.

With a wail of despair, the Fallen Angel fell to earth, but before she had even reached the pavement this time her entire body had disintegrated into black dust.

Vergil's ethereal form looked down at them for a moment, and then it too dissolved. Nero let out a cry of dismay, and a second later the blue energy around him dissipated too until there was nothing left. Yamato slipped from his numb fingers and fell to the ground with a clang.

"I can't believe he…he would…" Nero felt a hand on his shoulder and he looked up at Dante who had a somewhat bemused expression on his once-more human face.

Out of instinct, Nero turned around to look behind him. The energy ghost was there, looking at the angel. Vergil had the feather from the Tear between two glowing fingers. When the artifact had been shattered, it was now apparent that all of the energy it had contained had absorbed into the feather instead of dissipating. It could really be called a feather any more, to be honest. It was shaped like one but it had entirely crystallized, and it let off the same pulsing energy that the orb had before Nero had combined the two items.

After a second still frozen, the angel shuddered. The hole in his chest started to close then, and he reached out with the fingers of his skeletal hand to take the crystalline feather Vergil offered. As soon as the bone fingertips touched the object, it burst into a bright white flame, catching the angel in its blaze. All of the chains, and bandages and blood burned away under the flame until the angel stood before them whole and blazing bright. The flame dissipated then, and Remiel turned his blue eyes to take in the three devils that stood before him as a bright corona of light burst into brilliance above his silver hair.

Solemnly the angel finally turned his gaze to Vergil's evanescent form and said, "I cannot give you what you have asked. Even if it _were_ in my power I would not do it. Not for one who holds so little value for life."

His gaze swept once more over Dante and Nero's faces before he added, "However…to repay my debt, I can set you on the path to doing it for yourself."

The angel reached out a long, thin finger and touched the tip to the center of Vergil's forehead. The blue energy fizzled around the touch for a moment before the blue devil vanished totally. On the ground next to Nero's foot, Yamato also shimmered and suddenly vanished as well.

"What did you just do!?" Nero shouted.

"I sent him where he needs to go," Remiel answered blankly, "Just as you need doing."

Nero froze, "Wh-what?"

The angel looked back as Cassius' body on the ground, and a shadow of regret, or maybe even anguish, passed across his face. "Neither of you belong here, now. It goes against the natural order. If I hadn't brought you here in the first place…he would probably still be alive."

"Well you can—I mean, you're an angel. Just…bring him back to life or something," sputtered the Knight.

Remiel turned sad eyes back to Nero and said, "No. While some angels may possess that gift, I do not. I am a warrior, a killer, not a healer. Not a miracle worker. Not in _that _way, at least. The boy is dead."

Nero felt a twinge of guilt then, as he stared at Cassius' still form. He had never liked the guy, that was true, and even briefly entertained the idea of teaching the bastard a lesson himself. But this was just too much. It was so stupid. And it was his fault wasn't it? Nero didn't even know if Cassius had a family that would miss him.

"So you're taking Nero with you?" Dante spoke up, frowning.

"Yes," answered the angel as he bent to pick up the human's body, "Back to his rightful time."

"Don't worry Dante," Nero grinned weakly, "We'll…see each other again. In a few years."

The man in red grimaced slightly, but shrugged a second later, "Well, I guess…this is goodbye then. For now. Seriously, I wasn't expecting you to go and disappear on me today. The only thing on my agenda was kickin' ass but…fate's a bitch."

Nero snorted, "Yep, sure is."

Dante grabbed the Knight's arm and leaned in, surprising Nero for a second before he realized what was happening. Then, he too leaned in for the kiss, wrapping his arms tightly around Dante.

Finally after they parted Nero mumbled to the angel, "You sure I can't stay?"

Remiel's face was impassive, "If you stayed in this time, it would at worst lead to an unbalancing of the temporal plane, or at best…you die in a horrible way that would not have occurred in your natural timeline."

Nero looked at Cassius' body in the angel's arms and winced, "Yeah, okay, I get your point."

As he stepped forward to join the angel, his appearance abruptly changed, and Nero found himself clad in his original clothing. He frowned down at it, but it looked like new. He looked up at the angel in askance.

"Nothing from this timeline should be going back with us," Remiel answered.

"What about that?" Nero pointed to the sword still on the angel's back.

"That doesn't count."

Dante snorted, and Nero rolled his eyes, "Uh huh…okay then… I guess…let's do it."

His last sight was the devastated look on Dante's face.

* * *

It seemed like forever ago since he was last here, but Nero was back in the underground cell. There was shouting, confusion and a light. No, that wasn't a light, it was the angel. Remiel stood next to him, towering nearly seven feet tall now, and so bright that he lit the entire dark cell around them.

Slowly, the angel placed Cassius' body in Nero's arms and said, "I hope that he will forgive me."

Nero didn't have time to ask what that enigmatic comment meant before the shining being vanished into a pillar of golden light, leaving the cell in darkness.

"What the hell happened!" someone demanded—Regulus, Nero recognized the older Knight's voice in the darkness.

"It vanished!" Leone answered.

"Torches! Get your damn torches on! Is everyone alright?" Regulus shouted again as his torch flicked on, followed by several others.

"I think so," Leone answered, though his injuring from the Cutlass was dripping.

"I am, and Daniele…should be okay too," Davide answered a second later.

Finally, Nero spoke up, stepping into the beam of light from Leone's torch with Cassius in his arms, the teen's head cradled against the half-devil's shoulder, "Cassius is dead."

A silence fell over the group of men for a moment before someone, Nero wasn't sure who, muttered, "Shit."

"I'm sorry," Nero blurted, "It was my fault. I shouldn't have—"

"No, no," Regulus interrupted, pinching the bridge of his nose and frowning even more deeply than usual, "Don't start that. We knew what we were getting into when we came down here…for the most part. We'll need to return now I think and…regroup. Did the boy have any family?"

"No," Leone answered, "He was fostered with Order. He didn't have anyone but us."

"Damn," the older man shook his head, "Alright, let's move out and…get this mess sorted out."

* * *

There was a funeral but Nero didn't go. He hadn't liked Cassius enough when he was alive for it to seem right to attend just because he felt guilty about getting the kid killed. Instead, Nero sat on a roof and watched the funeral from a distance.

"So, this is where you got to."

Nero turned around, frowning. "Kyrie?"

She smiled at him and sat carefully on the edge of the roof beside him, "It seems like a lot happened to you yesterday. I…I know I haven't been here for you like I should have. Do you want to talk about it?"

_You have no idea,_ Nero thought, but he shook his head. "No, I don't really feel like now's the time…"

"Do you need anything?" she offered, putting a hand on his shoulder gently.

Nero was about to say no, but he paused after opening his mouth and thought about it. "Well," he finally said, "I guess you could help me make some travel arrangements."

She looked confused for a moment but finally asked, "Where to?"

True to her word, Kyrie had helped Nero plan the entire trip, from the boat ride to the vehicle transport. Nero didn't actually _know_ how to drive a car but it didn't take him too long to figure it out through some trial and error. He and Kyrie 'borrowed' some funds from the Order to obtain a vehicle that he could use for the trip, and before long he was off and on his way.

It had only been a day for Nero since he had seen Dante last, but years had passed since that moment for Dante. He wondered what it had felt like for the other, now much older, man to meet Nero and to go unrecognized. Nero felt almost embarrassed now about the way he had behaved back then.

When he finally made it to the doorstep of the Devil May Cry shop after so many long hours of driving, he hesitated. The shop itself looked exactly the same, if a little more run down than it had been before. The doors looked new at least. Nero wondered what the story behind _that_ was.

Finally, Nero mustered up the balls to push the door open. The little bell above it tinkled, signaling his arrival. A woman greeted him first, Gloria. Or, no, that wasn't her real name.

"Triss, right?" Nero guessed.

She laughed, putting her hands on her hips, "No sweetie, but you're close. It's Trish."

"Ah right, sorry," Nero mumbled before asking, "I came to see Dante."

He tried to peer around the blonde woman to see the rest of the shop, but there was no one else there.

"Sorry, doll, Dante's not in right now. You can wait for him if you want to? I'm sure he'll be glad to see you," Trish smiled at him and offered a seat on the couch.

It was a new couch at least, Nero saw. Well, 'new' being an operative term here because the thing was arguably more dilapidated then the old one. What was it with Dante and his refusal to buy decent furniture?

Trish sat in the chair behind Dante's desk with a dainty sigh, putting her feet up and looking over at Nero, "So how have you been doing? Didn't see much of you during or after the business in Fortuna. That Order of the Sword still treating you good?"

Nero shrugged one shoulder. "I guess. They're still trying to fix all the shit that happened. Kinda hard to go on when all your superiors turned out to be demons."

She laughed, nodding, "I guess it would be. Well I hope Dante and I didn't spoil your day _too_ much there."

The Knight snorted. "I don't have anything against you. If I did I wouldn't be here."

Trish nodded, leaning back in her chair. "That seems reasonable. Any reason you decided to come up here to visit us so soon?"

What was Nero supposed to say to that? How could he explain this to Dante's current partner, a woman he'd barely spoken to before?

He shrugged and managed weakly, "I just…wanted to see Dante…"

The woman quirked an eyebrow at him, but didn't tease him like he'd thought she might. Instead she shrugged and said, "Alright. I'll butt out."

Nero felt a little relieved and ran a hand through his hair nervously. This woman made him a little uncomfortable but he couldn't really put his finger on why.

After a few moment of awkward silence he finally asked, "When did you and Dante become partners?"

Trish looked thoughtful for a moment before replying, "Well, we met a few years ago when I sorta hired him for a job. And we just…set up shop together afterward. He changed the name for a few months after we partnered up but…I don't know the original name probably had some special significance for him so the new one didn't stick."

"What—you changed the name? What to?" Nero demanded, surprised.

"_Devil Never Cry_," she answered, "I thought it was pretty nice but…not my shop really."

Nero winced. The name didn't sound right at all in his opinion, but he'd gotten used to calling the shop _Devil May Cry_ and the changed one sounded a little silly.

The door opened then and in stepped Dante. _Finally._ He didn't notice Nero at first as he walked in and hung up his sword and guns before giving Trish a brief greeting. The red-clad devil hunter was halfway to the fridge before he stopped, and turned to look at Nero on the couch.

The two men stared at each other for several moments before Nero finally managed a weak, "I lost Yamato."

Dante looked confused for a second, until realization dawned on him and he crossed the office in four quick strides and grabbed Nero, pulling him into a desperate kiss that lasted until Nero had to break away for air.

Trish's face was completely shocked and she stared at the two of them for a moment with her mouth hanging wide open.

"What's the matter, Trish?" Dante teased her, "Never seen two men kiss before?"

She sputtered for a moment before managing, "I—well did something happen in Fortuna that I missed?"

Nero laughed at that and slung an arm over Dante's shoulders, "I don't know if you'd believe it if we told you."

"Well, she might actually," Dante contradicted, "But it's kind of a long story."

"I don't suppose you've heard from Vergil since then?" the Knight asked weakly.

Dante's face fell for a second, and he said, "I…well, sort of. I think it happened before he did…whatever it was that he did with you. I've been trying to figure that out for a while but it's just too…"

"Yeah I know what you mean," Nero muttered, rolling his eyes, "I guess he's…doing alright wherever he is…"

"Ok, I'm…I'm going to go and let you two catch up?" Trish interrupted, looking so terribly confused it was hilarious. The woman left the shop very quickly, leaving Dante and Nero alone together finally.

"You got any plans for the rest of the night?" Dante asked.

Nero punched him in the chest playfully. "You idiot. You know I don't."

Dante leaned down and kissed him again.

* * *

**The End**

* * *

I hope everyone can be at least moderately satisfied with this ending! I am pretty satisfied myself but, hey, I wrote it. XD I am planning to add a bonus chapter (or 2?) to sum up any lingering questions you all might have about where Vergil ended up, or about Cassius. I know some of you were dismayed about Cassius' untimely demise and if you want some more about him and/or Remiel just let me know either in a message or a review and I will bow to popular demand. Same goes for Vergil or any other topic.

Anyways, it has been a fabulous journey with you all! This story has gotten me a lot of new followers so I hope that you will also enjoy whatever I choose to write in the future.


End file.
